Reading Diary A: Southwestern and California Legends

(Coyote in Yosemite National Park in California)

For this week, I read the Southwestern and California Legends unit. I really liked these stories because they provide a different approach to creation legends and myths, but they share a lot of similar elements like coyotes and bears.

I most enjoyed the stories that were from Arizona, but that’s probably because Tucson is located in Pima county, named after the group of Native Americans who lived in the area. One of these stories that I liked the most was Coyote and the Tortillas, which tells the story of how the coyote drowns after trying to get tortillas from a woman that were meant for someone else. To me, this story tells the perils of wanting something that is not yours. The woman tricks the coyote into thinking the water is shallow by standing on a stump, so when he climbs down the tree to get them from her, he falls into the water and downs. In the same way, when we want things that are not ours, and we coerce other people in giving them to us, we put ourselves in danger of getting “in over our heads” as the coyote did, causing him to lose everything.