He hugs me and introduces me to other members of the society, starting with the eldest. Each greets me with a courtesy and intensity that excludes all other thought. By this time, Jemez people have returned from the burial site and begun to join the queue. I realize I am at the head of a receiving line for hundreds of people. It is intensely emotional.
Many people are weeping openly, others are somber.
Yet each person takes my hands, hugs me and thanks me. Many of the older people, their brown wrinkled faces wet with tears, bless me. Only the younger teenagers seem a little uncertain how to behave. As people continue to return, the line becomes amorphous, people gather in knots and start to tell stories. At the conclusion, she said, there was a gust of wind out of the church and it was clear to all present that something had been freed.