Hard choice to make: stay or go?

MONUMENT VALLEY — An American flag and two American Indian banners flap in the breeze atop a wooden shelter where Denise and Chris Tsosie sell handmade jewelry.

A sweeping rainstorm momentarily took the edge off the searing afternoon sun illuminating the stunning buttes and delicate pinnacles that dominate this sliver of the Navajo Nation. The two youngest of the Tsosies' five children play in the red dirt next to the roadside stand.

German tourists browse at the hematite bracelets and necklaces adorned with turquoise and other stones. They leave without buying.

"Some days are good," Denise Tsosie says. "Some days are bad."

"Some days you don't get anything," Chris Tsosie adds.

The stand is one of several south of Mexican Hat on U.S. 163. Not all Navajos in southeastern Utah scratch out a living this way. But many do. Job opportunities are scarce.

On Tuesdays, a group of young men in their late teens and early 20s gathers just off U.S. 163, where a Wayne County farmer parks his semitrailer truck piled with hay. For a few dollars, they load area residents' pickup trucks as they converge to buy feed for their animals.

A pair of gaunt wild horses also show up to munch scraps that fall to the ground, their protruding ribs a further sign of lean times.

Young American Indians living on reservations often reach a crossroads in their late teens: stay or go. Some choose to attend college or maybe join the armed forces. Or they move to a city to look for jobs. Others decide to live on the reservation to take whatever work is available.

"It's really about personal choice," said Nino Reyos, a Ute from the Uintah and Ouray Reservation in eastern Utah. He now lives in Rose Park.

The Tsosies make jewelry out of necessity. Catering to tourists is one of the few things they can do in Monument Valley to feed their families.

A heavy equipment operator by trade, Chris worked mostly in Arizona and Colorado while his family remained in Monument Valley. He injured his spinal cord in a car accident five years ago. He just recently shed a cane. His left arm and leg remain weak. He helps his wife string beads as therapy.

Denise Tsosie, who attended Layton High School before returning to the reservation, wants her children to go to college and get jobs elsewhere.

"I don't think there's anything to do around here," she said.

Seventeen-year-old Chasitty Yazzie intends to follow that path.

The Monument Valley High School senior already has credits at the College of Eastern Utah through concurrent enrollment. It inspired her to continue her education.