Apache Heart

Thump, thump…thump, thump. Randi sighed, the sound was unmistakable, the rear tire on her new-to-her, but aging, truck had gone flat. She eased over to the side of the dusty road. That used car dealer in Albuquerque had seemed a little shady, she thought, but the price had been right on the small, red pick-up. There was some rust on the bumper, and some dings in the doors, but the motor purred when she turned the key. At least the tire had lasted for the better part of two hundred miles as she drove south and west toward mountains and the Sierra Blanca Apache Reservation.

As Randi got out, she scanned the landscape around her. The rocky hills were slowing burning from spring green to summer brown, and most of the trees dotting the land were firs, pines, and scrubby junipers. The Sierra Blanca range rose up in the distance, snow still capping the tops of the highest peaks. One thing was sure: New Mexico sure didn’t looks like Frenchtown, New Jersey. Other than the “New,” the two places didn’t seem to have much in common. She had a feeling she was going to be missing the Delaware River, and the lush greenness of the little town with its Victorian houses and quaint cafes and boutiques.

Her high desert exile was only for two years, she reminded herself. In exchange for her commitment to practice on the Sierra Blanca Apache Reservation, the Federal Indian Health Service program was going to forgive $40,000 of her medical school loans. And for a girl from an ordinary middle class family in Frenchtown, New Jersey, well, that was a deal she couldn’t really pass up, considering that she was starting her career over $100,000 in debt to the University of Pennsylvania.