Living in Balance: A Pueblo Woman Discusses Her Balanced Life Philosophy

Enlarge Image Image Gallery An entrance into her creative space, this living gate protects Roxanne’s privacy. Photography by Lark Smothermon

Down an unpaved, unnamed country road on Santa Clara Pueblo in northern New Mexico, Roxanne Swentzell lives on old family ground near the houses of her brother, her aunt, and her grandmother. Here she built her own house, reared and homeschooled two children, transformed half a desert acre into a jungle of sustenance, and created the clay sculptures that have made her one of the most sought-after contemporary ceramists in the United States.

Roxanne’s patch of land is an idyllic island set amid the poverty and worn care of Rio Arriba County. A couple of horses, a few sheep, turkeys, and chickens contentedly roam their pens within distant views of the snowcapped Sangre de Cristo Mountains. There’s growth everywhere—peaches, apricots, herbs, asparagus, purple grapes hanging heavily from lush vines. Roxanne lives a simple life, limiting her wants to a few basic necessities, raising her own food, baking bread and pies from scratch, and making as many of her own supplies as possible.

“I’ve always liked to grow things,” she explains, “and I’ve always had animals around me. They are my friends. I love to watch things grow. Now I live in this jungle,” she says, gesturing sweepingly at her out-of-control surroundings and laughing. “I need to cut down some trees so I can get some sunlight. If I’m going to live in a solar house, I need to keep the sunlight coming in!”

Healing through permaculture

When she first moved to her desert half-acre in 1986, Roxanne set up housekeeping with her two small children in an old shed, determined to get used to the rhythms of her land before building a permanent dwelling. One morning, still in pajamas, she walked to a chosen patch of earth and drew an outline on the ground with a stick. Then she started digging a foundation.

She knew what she wanted in a house. It had to be adobe, and it had to be powered by solar energy. It doesn’t make sense in the Southwest not to have solar, she insists. She wanted a typical northern New Mexico territorial-style house with a pitched roof and two second-story dormers large enough to walk into. And she wanted a big kitchen with access to the outdoors.

Roxanne built the house mostly by herself, with help now and then from friends and family. After a year she was ready to move in.

Around this time she met and married Joel Glanzberg, an itinerate gardener with a passion for permaculture, an Australian concept developed in the 1950s that literally means “permanent culture.” Permaculture allows people to live sustainably off the land without destroying it. With Joel’s help, Roxanne turned her attention to the land.

They built up the soil with manure, straw, and anything they could find. Roaming turkeys and chickens helped fertilize the yard. They laid out trails so other parts of the land could heal and regenerate. Around the trails they planted bushes, trees, and herbs. They built a large cold frame on the south side of the house where they could grow greens year-round. Then they created an inner courtyard surrounded by an adobe wall, with microclimates where various kinds of plants thrive.