About halfway through my meeting with Warren Douglas Goodman on September 14 — as we sat on the ground, in the center of his Medicine Wheel sculpture — I asked if he would mind me recording our conversation.
“I was hoping you would,” he told me. So I turned on my audio recorder. Half an hour later, we climbed into our separate vehicles and headed off to our separate lives. Our very different, separate lives.
But maybe not so separate as before?
The recording starts with my question to Mr. Goodman. What exactly is the purpose of this Medicine Wheel, constructed on a junk-strewn property in Aspen Springs, Colorado? The Wheel or Circle was constructed mainly of large chunks of petrified wood, arranged in a pattern. In the center of the circle was a tall pole with ropes extending in the Four Directions: North, East, South and West. Among some American Indian tribes, these are the four sacred directions.
Scattered on the ground were pieces of glass, and other shiny objects.
Warren Goodman: “This is an organic computer. Like Stonehenge. If you study the word, annual, it derives from studying the rings in trees. These petrified stones are still alive, and they are vibrating. They have memory. This is a living library of the planet.”
He motioned towards the stones forming the 40-foot ring surrounding us.
“These are the Hopi Tablets.”
He pulled out a photograph from a pile of documents he’d brought to our meeting, and I saw a boy standing beside the Medicine Circle, with his hand raised. The boy was Mr. Goodman’s son, Burlin.
Seemingly balanced on his hand was a circle of white light — which could have been a flaw in the photo processing. Or could it have been a spiritual event, caught on film.
In Mr. Goodman’s view of the world, his Medicine Circle was helping maintain a crucial but delicate balance of power for the entire planet, and especially for America. The Circle was, in his view, part of a ‘power grid’ that extended from Aspen Springs to Chimney Rock, and was — as a library of history — intimately connected to the illegal confiscations of land by various government agencies, dating back to the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1848. That treaty — officially titled the ‘Treaty of Peace, Friendship, Limits and Settlement between the United States of America and the Mexican Republic’ — includes a promise by the US government to honor the sovereign land rights of the American Indians living within the territories ceded to the US following the Mexican-American War. Those territories included Texas and California, and parts of Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, and Wyoming. The treaty also guarantees American citizenship to Native Americans living in the ceded territories.
As I understand history, the US government failed, in many cases, to honor its promises — and proceeded to confiscate numerous lands traditionally used by various American Indian tribes, while also denying them citizenship.
Mr. Goodman claims a Cherokee heritage. Recent actions by the Archuleta County government had been threatening to — essentially — confiscate his one-acre parcel in Aspen Springs, by placing a lien on the property valued at tens of thousands of dollars. Will this ‘legal’ process become a model for future government land grabs in Aspen Springs?
Mr. Goodman felt it might.
As I understand it, the Goodman family purchased a one-acre parcel of land within the Aspen Springs subdivision in 1995. According to the County Assessor map, the property is now owned by Verna Davis — as of July 13 of this year. How that property transfer to Ms. Davis will play into the planned actions of the County government, I have no idea.
One question in my mind, however, concerns the authority of a County government to remove a person’s home from his or her property. Granted, the dwelling might be a old RV or travel trailer, but it might have been “home” to a person or a family for 25 years or longer. Incarcerating a person for criminal behavior is one thing. A jail sentence typically has a beginning, and an end. But to confiscate a person’s dwelling and their land, and make that person homeless, seems like something totally different. It feels very final, and permanent.
Mr. Goodman, meanwhile, seems satisfied with the way things are proceeding at the moment, now that the property is owned by Verna and Andy Davis. Mr. Goodman has already relocated, and his wife and son are being evicted off the property.
Except that Mr. Goodman no longer views them as ‘his wife and son.’
“Those two are possessed right now,” he confided. Possessed, as in ‘possessed by evil spirits.’
“Methamphetamine is a mind-controlling, demonizing, Zombie-creating drug. That’s not my wife, and that’s not my son. They’re the ones closest to me, and they can do the most damage.”
While we were talking, a car pulled up in the driveway and two people stepped out. Perhaps they were hesitant to enter the property, seeing Warren and I standing in the Medicine Circle?
“We’re going to come back and help Burlin,” they called to us. “Let him know that we’ll be back shortly.” The car drove off.
“Tweakers,” Warren mumbled. Meth addicts.
“There’s a Zombie apocalypse going on up here. I’ve had drug lords from Mexico here. I mean, this has been the headquarters for all the [meth] in this county. Right here, where you’re standing.
“I’ve got incident reports that thick.” He indicated with his fingers a large measurement. But for whatever reason, the drug trade has continued to flourish here at 187 Bill’s Place, despite the pile of incident reports. Or so Mr. Goodman claims.
“I’ve been trying to get these people off my property,” he said, presumably referring to his own wife and son, as well as their friends. He expressed his hope that the property will finally get cleaned up, now that it’s under new ownership. And that it will no longer serve as a drug headquarters.
As he spread out his documents on the dusty ground — collected papers which he believes document immoral acts against humanity by governments and powerful individuals — he asked, with desperation in his voice:
“You don’t see a crime committed here? I’m in shock. I’ve got Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. I’ve been to Axis Health. I’ve talked to [mental health counselor] Josh Bramble. I’ve talked to the psychiatrists.
“I’m fucked up! They caused this environment…”