tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-88191268549007931892024-03-14T05:11:02.232-05:00NovabaseNovamation's Cross-Country Journey of ForgivenessChrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12256607085558454970noreply@blogger.comBlogger77125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8819126854900793189.post-12985277212208985882009-07-09T16:17:00.002-05:002009-07-09T16:20:26.430-05:00A Good PathThis was a collaborative effort between Marlin and I several years ago: he provided video and sound, I did the editing and some scripting.<br /><br />This is a test to see if it's possible to stream it effectively.<br /><br /><br /><object id="veohFlashPlayer" name="veohFlashPlayer" width="410" height="341"><param name="movie" value="http://www.veoh.com/static/swf/webplayer/WebPlayer.swf?version=AFrontend.5.4.2.21.1001&permalinkId=v18740537HbP2J6gT&player=videodetailsembedded&videoAutoPlay=0&id=21805054"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><embed src="http://www.veoh.com/static/swf/webplayer/WebPlayer.swf?version=AFrontend.5.4.2.21.1001&permalinkId=v18740537HbP2J6gT&player=videodetailsembedded&videoAutoPlay=0&id=21805054" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" id="veohFlashPlayerEmbed" name="veohFlashPlayerEmbed" width="410" height="341"></embed></object><br /><span style="font-size:78%;">Watch <a href="http://www.veoh.com/browse/videos/category/activism_non_profit/watch/v18740537HbP2J6gT">Mikana Movie.divx</a> in <a href="http://www.veoh.com/browse/videos/category/activism_non_profit">Activism & Non-Profit</a> | View More <a href="http://www.veoh.com/">Free Videos Online at Veoh.com</a></span>Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12256607085558454970noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8819126854900793189.post-3659502016554876132009-07-03T19:50:00.002-05:002009-07-03T19:53:06.865-05:00The Final Words<div style="text-align: center;">There is only one Creator, and he cares and watches out for us all.<br />When He appears, some will see an angel.<br />Others will see a white bison.<br /></div><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqrRejHVhiaUmDyt8PuV2rVsb7IrVm8mj47ecKNK1R5d4ohjFnu3cfwTY1rxsZFXpfiEpfXulVZp-Z2GcR_jUqLXKr8V8UzH9w_PqZiM2bGbIpgCBTCXVN2nXAdyNnqFR3b38Jl-5JiPQ/s1600-h/DSC_0779.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqrRejHVhiaUmDyt8PuV2rVsb7IrVm8mj47ecKNK1R5d4ohjFnu3cfwTY1rxsZFXpfiEpfXulVZp-Z2GcR_jUqLXKr8V8UzH9w_PqZiM2bGbIpgCBTCXVN2nXAdyNnqFR3b38Jl-5JiPQ/s320/DSC_0779.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354401245623552674" border="0" /></a><br /><br />Thank you for reading.<br /><br /><span style="font-size:180%;"><span style="font-style: italic; font-family: arial;">Chris</span></span>Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12256607085558454970noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8819126854900793189.post-18958772778262892302009-07-03T18:54:00.004-05:002009-07-03T19:49:50.722-05:00What Now?And that leaves us with a question. The big one. What now?<br /><br />For me, my work is fairly well cut out for me. I need to sort thousands of photographs and 163 hours of footage, trying to make some sense out of the image overkill. The question still lingers as to how that will integrate with my normal work schedule. The possibility of closing Novamation Studios semi-permanently to focus on this one project seems... well, a possibility.<br /><br />Emotionally, things are less clear. On arriving home, I found myself almost immediately adrift. Besides the instant disappearance of the brutal but exciting pace of the last six weeks -- which is a notable factor, itself -- I'm left with a head full of thoughts that have nowhere to go. I immersed myself into a world of tortured children and shattered adults; now I'm back in Nebish. What do I... what do I <span style="font-weight: bold; font-style: italic;">do </span>with these things I know? How do I make my peace with a world that's changed, with a country that will never seem the same again? And that other world I experienced for all that time -- it hasn't gone anywhere. The truth is that it's still all around every one of us; a living world that's still in deep pain.<br /><br />And I'll have to learn to live with that fact. The first step: I acknowledge that this world of mass graves on American soil is true. I acknowledge that horrible things were done in the name of my country and my religion. I acknowledge that the victims are still here today. I acknowledge that everyone who has ever looked away bears responsibility, including myself. I am guilty. And I am sorry.<br /><br />I will do my part to aid the healing. The time to overcome has arrived, and I'm thankful I was given an opportunity to contribute in such a direct way.<br /><br />And, surrounded by 163 tapes, perhaps my work has really only just started.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtmzjMID3QqQcBEgNGIdvWyQCtpsqy_LUIf5oJSPBv1TsOEHIqZrW2BcnCPhgQNX2-z_Lo_8fBTjN0AQVcPzwVXRa6q8zA-YrmOqtgpQyIMEu_3euJCqXqv1nS_ReEZrrM5J0KFpSTA00/s1600-h/DSC_0112.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtmzjMID3QqQcBEgNGIdvWyQCtpsqy_LUIf5oJSPBv1TsOEHIqZrW2BcnCPhgQNX2-z_Lo_8fBTjN0AQVcPzwVXRa6q8zA-YrmOqtgpQyIMEu_3euJCqXqv1nS_ReEZrrM5J0KFpSTA00/s320/DSC_0112.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354392288108145890" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><br />***<br /><br />For you, Gentle Reader, I can't answer the question. Everyone decides "What Now?" for themselves a thousand times for a thousand different issues. If you'd like to know more, resources are out there, as are other perspectives than mine. Or, if you'd like to forget about all of this, you'll lead a life that's a little more comfortable -- I can't deny anyone that choice.<br /><br />For me, for better or for worse, this story is now a part of who I am.<br /><br />If you want to keep learning, here's a few stepping stones for you.<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">WHITE BISON</span><br /><a href="http://www.whitebison.org/">Main Page</a><br /><a href="http://www.whitebison.org/wellbriety-journey/NewsStories.htm">News Updates</a><br /><a href="http://www.whitebison.org/meditation/index.php">Daily Meditation</a><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">LONNY'S VIDEOS</span><br />These are a little difficult to watch, as they haven't been edited in any way, but they can give you an idea of what went on.<br /><a href="http://www.youtube.com/user/mrlonnyp123#play/uploads/54/FHfdwRnYc2g">Main Page</a><br /><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UVPChBVsqlA">Chemawa, Part 1</a><br /><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FHfdwRnYc2g">DC, Part 1</a><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">MOUNT PLEASANT</span><br />These people were unbelievably well-organized. Their web site has (edited!) videos of the event in Michigan, written summaries, statements from local leaders and more. They even have images from DC. I love Mt. Pleasant. I've heard there's a great slideshow available on the site, as well, but I haven't found it yet.<br /><a href="http://www.sagchip.org/council/events/2009/2009-0617-JourneyForForgiveness/061709-JourneytoForgiveness.htm">Web Page</a><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">NEWSPAPERS</span><br /><a href="http://www.cherokeephoenix.org/3732/Article.aspx">Sequoia</a><br /><a href="http://media.www.cm-life.com/media/storage/paper906/news/2009/06/03/News/Journey.Of.Forgiveness.To.Heal.Past.With.Song.Dance-3745920.shtml">College Media</a><br /><a href="http://indiancountrynews.net/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=6583&Itemid=114">Indian Country</a><br /><a href="http://rhinelanderdailynews.com/articles/2009/06/13/news/doc4a33013160989789222536.txt">Lac Du Flambeau</a><br /><a href="http://www.reznetnews.org/article/indians-march-mend-boarding-school-hurt-35190">Oklahoma</a><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">FACEBOOK</span><br /><a href="http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/group.php?gid=83679341454">Mt. Pleasant, Again</a><br /><a href="http://apps.facebook.com/causes/43286?m=91e6b129&_fb_fromhash=14c075eb44785d8191cdaa2d0e91e346">Healing Project</a> (not sure what this is, but Lonny recommended it)<br /><a href="http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/group.php?gid=46036643782">White Bison</a> (the pictures seem to be down today)<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">BOOKS</span><br />Many books are available on <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Kill-Indian-Save-Man-Residential/dp/0872864340/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1246668061&sr=8-1">Amazon</a>. I can't specifically recommend any myself, as I haven't read any of them yet.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">THE MOVIE</span><br />I am, essentially, done with this blog now. In a few months, when clips from the eventual movie start coming together, I may post short clips here. I will certainly post them on my "normal" <a href="http://www.NovamationStudios.com">webpage</a>, and I imagine they will appear at <a href="http://www.whitebison.org">White Bison</a>, as well.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12256607085558454970noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8819126854900793189.post-33246703975013146582009-07-03T18:32:00.003-05:002009-07-03T18:54:43.584-05:00There and Back Again<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6TPO0dRpRD0PngG2l59cqzvrvNcwnU9llOXFIs1kxxN3aNFwYU1xVObpNbdiwD_zXkVWS8AWbXSQ89QmbY7kViwzT68R1O64vFoZzXXyeWEOovoOsiG_QjD3dM7lRosg6QZHyhhj6f2k/s1600-h/DSC_0092.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6TPO0dRpRD0PngG2l59cqzvrvNcwnU9llOXFIs1kxxN3aNFwYU1xVObpNbdiwD_zXkVWS8AWbXSQ89QmbY7kViwzT68R1O64vFoZzXXyeWEOovoOsiG_QjD3dM7lRosg6QZHyhhj6f2k/s320/DSC_0092.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354381814980450418" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTcosAN-boOFC6u0VarqeJURRMDr1PZBwsSE0xuI3Cp-2eMfZUWPNlSkyB4nY14LdeLPOmKY3yTEis2QwB7zwHHEdFle54hBeqyLwclrDPzO-ivbY0XCjTfj5f4grFscp_ULoS5KQxUHw/s1600-h/DSC_0009.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTcosAN-boOFC6u0VarqeJURRMDr1PZBwsSE0xuI3Cp-2eMfZUWPNlSkyB4nY14LdeLPOmKY3yTEis2QwB7zwHHEdFle54hBeqyLwclrDPzO-ivbY0XCjTfj5f4grFscp_ULoS5KQxUHw/s320/DSC_0009.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354381811401364850" border="0" /></a><br />Finding ourselves parked in several cars deep (I guess it was the valet section. Oops.), Patrick and I spent a day checking out Washington. The plan had been to head north and visit my friends in New York, but those plans were foiled by the need to return the rental van and my sudden driving urge to be back home.<br /><br />The van probably deserves its own paragraph. Penske found one last way to screw with us. These are, mind you, the same people who gave away the car I had reserved initially, triggering all this vehicular wackiness in the first place. At the 11th hour, they changed their mind about the return of the van, refusing to accept any other options. The plan had been to drop it off in Fargo, catch a ride somehow to Minneapolis, and use car (parked there) to make it home. Penske decided it would be better if we returned it to Oregon, instead. I cannot be clear enough: they went back on their original word -- Fargo had originally been fine.<br /><br />I hear good things about U-Haul.<br /><br />Anyways, we found someone in Minneapolis willing to drive it back -- for an appropriate fee and airfare home. My job became getting it to him as soon as possible, in hopes that it would return to Oregon by the 1st.<br /><br />But, being parked in, we spent a day looking at the city. A brief trip to the Holocaust museum quickly became more than I felt I could handle. The worst problem was the research I'd been hearing about; people are now looking into the lessons of the boarding schools (started in 1879) that the Nazis may have implimented during the 1940s. Evidence seems to indicate that some ideas, particularly about dehumanization, may have been directly borrowed. Whenever something truly meaningful happens, for good or ill, the ripples stretch out for incredible distances.<br /><br />***<br /><br />Once we finally got out of the city, Patrick was good enough to do almost all the driving. I wrote, thought, and slept... and played Zelda. We travelled in an almost straight line, with few stops. I needed to be home.<br /><br />Maryland is very pretty. Wisconsin has reasonably affordable lazer tag. That's pretty much all I remember about the ride home. We dropped off the van with little fanfare in Minneapolis; I noted with smug satisfaction that everything in that huge, ungainly van fit into my '96 Camry. Together, Patrick and I made it to within 40 miles of home, at which point the transmition exploded.<br /><br />I finished playing Zelda (Oracle of Seasons) in a ditch less than an hour from home. We'll call that something like an accomplishment.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12256607085558454970noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8819126854900793189.post-15524928319125178322009-07-03T17:27:00.009-05:002009-07-03T18:31:53.469-05:00Washington, The Photos<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFqfzP5KTlsFyCS0CkRLh5heBxGnEl3KEi1StOn_Fmq9tlRfyOWTrMR7DalDGXp2UuHpUoMnE0ihXpn0SuZcDns9wdCZoZKFVRK-dXyqybY2oV1o8pgOyxShs8pCuhI3cKsgGVjnyo4AI/s1600-h/DSC_0264.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFqfzP5KTlsFyCS0CkRLh5heBxGnEl3KEi1StOn_Fmq9tlRfyOWTrMR7DalDGXp2UuHpUoMnE0ihXpn0SuZcDns9wdCZoZKFVRK-dXyqybY2oV1o8pgOyxShs8pCuhI3cKsgGVjnyo4AI/s320/DSC_0264.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354378174443881186" border="0" /></a>The Saganaw Chippewa have been huge supporters.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaxa2wN617Awcd_Y2qtqKn5k89IU3ZO419XeOdpaxE_0k8RMsDDLs5ouOJuI77-bFSr4YuXuNXXLsNWQTrRqI4DxM7CsDVRniJk2nqLxd83W9KSMgWcktU9UN-myt1dLMYutzYoFYgISY/s1600-h/DSC_0272.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaxa2wN617Awcd_Y2qtqKn5k89IU3ZO419XeOdpaxE_0k8RMsDDLs5ouOJuI77-bFSr4YuXuNXXLsNWQTrRqI4DxM7CsDVRniJk2nqLxd83W9KSMgWcktU9UN-myt1dLMYutzYoFYgISY/s320/DSC_0272.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354378171145455522" border="0" /></a>Joe looks on as the drum plays.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiniCq1qoaAHDRoxczYB3QAf7lhMjjlSITTlA9Yn4a_gmP6Y054AwkTgKeGdWK_XsqSsf57Aooasg3os1Cp5ylCE5kfQRoTtoE5cgZMbxaFFcNkh9Wjf6Hj6apOl1BPLes3zvTdOVdiBeY/s1600-h/DSC_0286.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiniCq1qoaAHDRoxczYB3QAf7lhMjjlSITTlA9Yn4a_gmP6Y054AwkTgKeGdWK_XsqSsf57Aooasg3os1Cp5ylCE5kfQRoTtoE5cgZMbxaFFcNkh9Wjf6Hj6apOl1BPLes3zvTdOVdiBeY/s320/DSC_0286.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354378161312304562" border="0" /></a>We had at least three drums at various times.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEheJX-XtL3u7H_7zQPcDWO_Nr9B9p2axxBQK6G4hO3NnODpD2PyJe_cdTsB6yZEkPkn3vRbsX2NRDKvUe0ee42av8hji83WVVTX9g45y7n-zylLOeitvBDkeSd-25-HHF7noU2Se_Ef5HA/s1600-h/DSC_0283.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 213px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEheJX-XtL3u7H_7zQPcDWO_Nr9B9p2axxBQK6G4hO3NnODpD2PyJe_cdTsB6yZEkPkn3vRbsX2NRDKvUe0ee42av8hji83WVVTX9g45y7n-zylLOeitvBDkeSd-25-HHF7noU2Se_Ef5HA/s320/DSC_0283.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354378154757076338" border="0" /></a>Joe, our master of ceremonies.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHYkq_UYApBAITkL5Ci8NjP-zqNxRIWy8IjHlOnxXDfOMmxDHS8Lg9S4aFU24RLxVFXbChpesvjuXTq_yT9IpGLcwExYYubJ3KljP-RZuKkfhQb4lxl82emywiSKta6olAbDTxN1YlNP0/s1600-h/DSC_0325.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHYkq_UYApBAITkL5Ci8NjP-zqNxRIWy8IjHlOnxXDfOMmxDHS8Lg9S4aFU24RLxVFXbChpesvjuXTq_yT9IpGLcwExYYubJ3KljP-RZuKkfhQb4lxl82emywiSKta6olAbDTxN1YlNP0/s320/DSC_0325.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354377130609659314" border="0" /></a>Horace opens with a prayer.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXcMY8RCTtRm00_k55Z5BfgQbCn2H7xuCbNv5uyKLKWN27ew6_tFLUAim-4Ih-UM1Gh-NrMrhwHe76bZpkORSLuEfN5HMsI0baVH_2_PqghPIRA7HoEv90RuEVSVFYY6oLH3F531hyphenhyphenuCU/s1600-h/DSC_0376.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXcMY8RCTtRm00_k55Z5BfgQbCn2H7xuCbNv5uyKLKWN27ew6_tFLUAim-4Ih-UM1Gh-NrMrhwHe76bZpkORSLuEfN5HMsI0baVH_2_PqghPIRA7HoEv90RuEVSVFYY6oLH3F531hyphenhyphenuCU/s320/DSC_0376.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354377119728463506" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkOa_wcLjGTJ8Mdor-NWRc57Mn1kp13yKXP7-wO4C6brFZFbCC-FN4LgwhGa0frt1yOr7t0V-KPtZOMcufRbJdwTv-VGv3Fv09kfUyBGqY2Ds25bqu4vdRqpfGIjnuS8J3Zj3oscZ1MP8/s1600-h/DSC_0386.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkOa_wcLjGTJ8Mdor-NWRc57Mn1kp13yKXP7-wO4C6brFZFbCC-FN4LgwhGa0frt1yOr7t0V-KPtZOMcufRbJdwTv-VGv3Fv09kfUyBGqY2Ds25bqu4vdRqpfGIjnuS8J3Zj3oscZ1MP8/s320/DSC_0386.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354377117851147490" border="0" /></a>The space reserved for us.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAdv7LIsY1ih86GntYlYcYOe3j9SHFW-V5EyxysngGHAJdKtXCkHZQSEpmtrLVpyljTb-0p7PIzrLm83kpcCKOLgcTA-5HwHcZekr7bOSNfLN9o-A6xdriFDT-X5B-cE2SsS6KkXdSaMs/s1600-h/DSC_0395.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAdv7LIsY1ih86GntYlYcYOe3j9SHFW-V5EyxysngGHAJdKtXCkHZQSEpmtrLVpyljTb-0p7PIzrLm83kpcCKOLgcTA-5HwHcZekr7bOSNfLN9o-A6xdriFDT-X5B-cE2SsS6KkXdSaMs/s320/DSC_0395.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354377110398438610" border="0" /></a>Marlin addresses the crowd.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgc-3GyZZ1pkLzj7mZaEAtFxTaolKAXkvW575ZaD7osxjVSfpdScBIb9TgVi-aWh6RuQDr3sLUIjIw270rzSmPMDSTcE3mSboImkXXBsESSKxKWDDT74fljHAZSbYblpGo-9Q8jNyuEAbU/s1600-h/DSC_0400+copy.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgc-3GyZZ1pkLzj7mZaEAtFxTaolKAXkvW575ZaD7osxjVSfpdScBIb9TgVi-aWh6RuQDr3sLUIjIw270rzSmPMDSTcE3mSboImkXXBsESSKxKWDDT74fljHAZSbYblpGo-9Q8jNyuEAbU/s320/DSC_0400+copy.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354376151274562770" border="0" /></a>Even in our end-of-Journey celebration, we steered clear of "light-hearted." There's just too much hurt out there.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTU6Z1YxpNu461UysvJFR1rVaDz8Se2f7yHClS8TOl5qzq7qlWOs8fhqPv3SYp3FLYwVH82FWPfuYC2t3Y7HedH9UrR9sURFbs2ZYMZzuwXUNeIAMQokhuEKKAMGhwGHG_3si2zmkD6jo/s1600-h/DSC_0402.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 213px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTU6Z1YxpNu461UysvJFR1rVaDz8Se2f7yHClS8TOl5qzq7qlWOs8fhqPv3SYp3FLYwVH82FWPfuYC2t3Y7HedH9UrR9sURFbs2ZYMZzuwXUNeIAMQokhuEKKAMGhwGHG_3si2zmkD6jo/s320/DSC_0402.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354376141368063074" border="0" /></a>Patrick helped run the cameras, often getting a sky-view.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGhipvjvTFTt5AMcOjTbRRDaJFBDdgNMS_EwZkumG368rf_CyfVKIysFt88bTZnHFRvmRCFGeY4VMYI1WCdZTwwUihV3NcSW6eZnz3cnbxRXKegzeoRs5DhC3_iYrtGFxpjDwFDEXC8zE/s1600-h/DSC_0404.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGhipvjvTFTt5AMcOjTbRRDaJFBDdgNMS_EwZkumG368rf_CyfVKIysFt88bTZnHFRvmRCFGeY4VMYI1WCdZTwwUihV3NcSW6eZnz3cnbxRXKegzeoRs5DhC3_iYrtGFxpjDwFDEXC8zE/s320/DSC_0404.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354376136308735954" border="0" /></a>One of the drummers reflects.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj23l-MuK4DBO82A22ioP8ZiDqoofKU9VLHlAMLeJxkFslltYF_xGtzqJnnsG6wf7LsU24I7NsbDxmdKSqvgYmvn798OS48jscu3jb1M7NvcxPQvNwmqYeIlqsbXWcJQSLFJzQcPELGA3w/s1600-h/DSC_0437.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj23l-MuK4DBO82A22ioP8ZiDqoofKU9VLHlAMLeJxkFslltYF_xGtzqJnnsG6wf7LsU24I7NsbDxmdKSqvgYmvn798OS48jscu3jb1M7NvcxPQvNwmqYeIlqsbXWcJQSLFJzQcPELGA3w/s320/DSC_0437.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354376131675951746" border="0" /></a>Dr. Duran.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjggzmMEZnIZOrH7El-bk10LJxnS_jHal4uPFUJsF0QSdhv0RFeM_FYJIkbv9mPTO5klUCNj_4ar7ANfiSzgCVI0zcQ-BkRFE_z-QDd5Sr9B4jYgCH9eWBtrscQAyTtVR_Wpjo5rGp3tUo/s1600-h/DSC_0444.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjggzmMEZnIZOrH7El-bk10LJxnS_jHal4uPFUJsF0QSdhv0RFeM_FYJIkbv9mPTO5klUCNj_4ar7ANfiSzgCVI0zcQ-BkRFE_z-QDd5Sr9B4jYgCH9eWBtrscQAyTtVR_Wpjo5rGp3tUo/s320/DSC_0444.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354376125497687042" border="0" /></a>Ozzie and Horace, again, along with Horace's wife.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizFkOPYlkAQqsDEIVx62AxnazZ-_JAmkrbiTA2fMAstT_hZWAxw32SQhGY9u4Bkhr3M8NkFRumwV6-btcG_Bqs3aT4MaNt5Zf9IN8FKWBWxeS09vzuP1IY1zWSey-7aVQ_N61Xj97VPv0/s1600-h/DSC_0454.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizFkOPYlkAQqsDEIVx62AxnazZ-_JAmkrbiTA2fMAstT_hZWAxw32SQhGY9u4Bkhr3M8NkFRumwV6-btcG_Bqs3aT4MaNt5Zf9IN8FKWBWxeS09vzuP1IY1zWSey-7aVQ_N61Xj97VPv0/s320/DSC_0454.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354368595372699458" border="0" /></a>The second drum group.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhgrmB0CjFoe4x2efgARJGnA_dqXp8P3ZsYziew3uvlYtu0cInw-Xc4V0dTyWcWi5vu2e-xm6ElRuLFTHSeFXaUt97_cp-nuLHZ2oCaigkCVrJJBAs8kBoDSOuXnqXTIA1bk5Vhyf3jxOM/s1600-h/DSC_0466.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhgrmB0CjFoe4x2efgARJGnA_dqXp8P3ZsYziew3uvlYtu0cInw-Xc4V0dTyWcWi5vu2e-xm6ElRuLFTHSeFXaUt97_cp-nuLHZ2oCaigkCVrJJBAs8kBoDSOuXnqXTIA1bk5Vhyf3jxOM/s320/DSC_0466.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354368585908546914" border="0" /></a>The third drum group.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgddz94OOS4sF-5mXWuM_cpTcTiWMUC-ns8KuEzGqdJcG3M8e5dbGkTtAJ33IhlRui_WMYhehO4COClNAG170e1uA3KzHznLRbF2o9noFW1Ca7dyqiRpNItcWJYISE2shKUPHH8KmmG-r4/s1600-h/DSC_0489.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgddz94OOS4sF-5mXWuM_cpTcTiWMUC-ns8KuEzGqdJcG3M8e5dbGkTtAJ33IhlRui_WMYhehO4COClNAG170e1uA3KzHznLRbF2o9noFW1Ca7dyqiRpNItcWJYISE2shKUPHH8KmmG-r4/s320/DSC_0489.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354368583933875666" border="0" /></a>Hunter talks about cultural impact.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijg-G0cfs-SN3dIr98zYPlblPxGzgTWvoVVjyw5fpO-K-1PubGARuHPD8FMp8Pq7u6i8nesV8Qdd5L6ZD3_evT05iv2X9V6BCOaBzUlQHFAiPiqXycB4qCgoK1yN8BHz46s7RTWGBSdfI/s1600-h/DSC_0538.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijg-G0cfs-SN3dIr98zYPlblPxGzgTWvoVVjyw5fpO-K-1PubGARuHPD8FMp8Pq7u6i8nesV8Qdd5L6ZD3_evT05iv2X9V6BCOaBzUlQHFAiPiqXycB4qCgoK1yN8BHz46s7RTWGBSdfI/s320/DSC_0538.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354368578534440338" border="0" /></a>I can't remember her name right this instant...<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbdVWyjDp-Ox9NDves_C1dpg-QKbnNNF4_aRryGnnBsCG3gxE7CFnvDTUjt7smeBM9qWsYRuc5A6-CTLc9MdASPkeisfXPpfnpOvxCr_NynP-1bjSmoczZPnY_QiFmRwswLPgZOccoaT0/s1600-h/DSC_0549.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbdVWyjDp-Ox9NDves_C1dpg-QKbnNNF4_aRryGnnBsCG3gxE7CFnvDTUjt7smeBM9qWsYRuc5A6-CTLc9MdASPkeisfXPpfnpOvxCr_NynP-1bjSmoczZPnY_QiFmRwswLPgZOccoaT0/s320/DSC_0549.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354368569067391042" border="0" /></a>This is actually the first time he's ever been asked to speak at the Smithsonian.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEij-NkUmqNYiMkAykjiBGtPXZe2mJCLjlEB0aEDyD-Sgz3OpXoBdqkI870h_8Su_Cbad0zH1nlLy73INCKOaZ89B6xHO0_BufZpet0J34YgNzbHUkAtTDFldv37yR3v3FJ66xIYiOm-OPs/s1600-h/DSC_0612.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEij-NkUmqNYiMkAykjiBGtPXZe2mJCLjlEB0aEDyD-Sgz3OpXoBdqkI870h_8Su_Cbad0zH1nlLy73INCKOaZ89B6xHO0_BufZpet0J34YgNzbHUkAtTDFldv37yR3v3FJ66xIYiOm-OPs/s320/DSC_0612.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354367435493710274" border="0" /></a>Look at those balconies start to fill!<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgU88Cf_xx86-06aELaU5d5r8-9nYmY-Sxh7l9HVN4z_5asx6ZWBdVXljjhj3wbpYuODOm4ogoLLuDKISIerROBYeVTlHoqAJoDSJVJq2a5VCH9fCvPKZmDYWDd_KONP6A7JuHyKlF_7qI/s1600-h/DSC_0657.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgU88Cf_xx86-06aELaU5d5r8-9nYmY-Sxh7l9HVN4z_5asx6ZWBdVXljjhj3wbpYuODOm4ogoLLuDKISIerROBYeVTlHoqAJoDSJVJq2a5VCH9fCvPKZmDYWDd_KONP6A7JuHyKlF_7qI/s320/DSC_0657.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354367430448696530" border="0" /></a>Everyone's prayers are needed, and the room filled when the time was right.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-ceVeLUJZBT9jNt6PPKfMQcSLJ5L6SHFtXUP1h6DavgsgdPLIesC_us8vsUqFu1AnpgJ3DYJxT1abbgs6f9PCSbTx3lUjMXfss0EhyphenhyphenlvKV7cFYydEjL6kJzp059HbtHdZoZivAXg7qds/s1600-h/DSC_0689.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-ceVeLUJZBT9jNt6PPKfMQcSLJ5L6SHFtXUP1h6DavgsgdPLIesC_us8vsUqFu1AnpgJ3DYJxT1abbgs6f9PCSbTx3lUjMXfss0EhyphenhyphenlvKV7cFYydEjL6kJzp059HbtHdZoZivAXg7qds/s320/DSC_0689.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354367426530596322" border="0" /></a>A mother and child dance around the cedar-ring.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgx75M7ujOQqtd1KjK53fWsQ0-UR0iuge6cbtGAL9z5unAWA7tnP-qC25Xcm5mnaUyyfATL6HOHP3Dk11ccEOBo_2tM1_OEFJlLMYL5XTh4hQek2xBa2sYENiQW-2dLr_HwcZ3y7W2smU4/s1600-h/DSC_0705.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgx75M7ujOQqtd1KjK53fWsQ0-UR0iuge6cbtGAL9z5unAWA7tnP-qC25Xcm5mnaUyyfATL6HOHP3Dk11ccEOBo_2tM1_OEFJlLMYL5XTh4hQek2xBa2sYENiQW-2dLr_HwcZ3y7W2smU4/s320/DSC_0705.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354367420240582178" border="0" /></a>The singers from Mt. Pleasant return.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxKE9oci6o7Mp6RrHqqiJpOaZ6CibAAWHdHzpOTU3Um9OPwkS3WU8wVNTGSFGV0rEaWZu9FYUgZNhHctoX787KcQZQKhVmkYhPhmfDd98pQi7Vruv4ukjXJ8JNwLs40URi8mGxTP4UcOY/s1600-h/DSC_0717.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxKE9oci6o7Mp6RrHqqiJpOaZ6CibAAWHdHzpOTU3Um9OPwkS3WU8wVNTGSFGV0rEaWZu9FYUgZNhHctoX787KcQZQKhVmkYhPhmfDd98pQi7Vruv4ukjXJ8JNwLs40URi8mGxTP4UcOY/s320/DSC_0717.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354367414350311186" border="0" /></a>It takes everyone.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtdKzbn3s2YHtB1ZdaInxJTxwr1bJkIqYifHw2VNLUpazsYMhG7clvVmI4u2JCrsXQY8pFu8cpEsCw-HXrNfjPAL83R_AMhFPplFJGldFKjB2rwn_l7ISnDsu0BqJrK6MZMmrW6K72epE/s1600-h/DSC_0738.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtdKzbn3s2YHtB1ZdaInxJTxwr1bJkIqYifHw2VNLUpazsYMhG7clvVmI4u2JCrsXQY8pFu8cpEsCw-HXrNfjPAL83R_AMhFPplFJGldFKjB2rwn_l7ISnDsu0BqJrK6MZMmrW6K72epE/s320/DSC_0738.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354365874136197890" border="0" /></a>Horace ends with a sacred song. Also pictured: Ozzie and Hunter.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-keNl3qrJXGsKc0Jf640ioMU2tPn05Crc0KA6_vIPfhqlL5BLx-Q4Q82i3J2e31tS2wlVNO9_J_G9h3SuXANCnFDj1zjiOVYdyVTpsDzZzrdfgejxsWhjUdap_bdAHwIWPzjnpalpZ9w/s1600-h/DSC_0745.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 213px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-keNl3qrJXGsKc0Jf640ioMU2tPn05Crc0KA6_vIPfhqlL5BLx-Q4Q82i3J2e31tS2wlVNO9_J_G9h3SuXANCnFDj1zjiOVYdyVTpsDzZzrdfgejxsWhjUdap_bdAHwIWPzjnpalpZ9w/s320/DSC_0745.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354365866695170514" border="0" /></a>Sometimes, interesting shots come from being forced to hang back from the action.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCdR1hKnkleoEgJ47aqyrMKvQC0AaoBNeghXrYQDGII6dRrBLZPEJSK3WULQ8vnCQtpoHfhAuqSO5dVZLTanwcnNqKYcIm-UG_Wbn6C4Qzdx1-Sv860e8SyHUdjan7WCRZ2kAUNFrHps0/s1600-h/DSC_0753.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCdR1hKnkleoEgJ47aqyrMKvQC0AaoBNeghXrYQDGII6dRrBLZPEJSK3WULQ8vnCQtpoHfhAuqSO5dVZLTanwcnNqKYcIm-UG_Wbn6C4Qzdx1-Sv860e8SyHUdjan7WCRZ2kAUNFrHps0/s320/DSC_0753.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354365863992708818" border="0" /></a>One of the ending songs, with innumerable hand-drums.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuEyP8d6LSJD6-NywLlMNtirJh0S1m3auz0I3Oj_mu1cWVIbcusHB42OJmHw_9MTdUzj9g7BLYb8WWHId67olXEYOIRZooJkClpVge273yEpxFPIRxd-ryAZFu5YWu2Sm-fFzmOntQ8fA/s1600-h/DSC_0770.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuEyP8d6LSJD6-NywLlMNtirJh0S1m3auz0I3Oj_mu1cWVIbcusHB42OJmHw_9MTdUzj9g7BLYb8WWHId67olXEYOIRZooJkClpVge273yEpxFPIRxd-ryAZFu5YWu2Sm-fFzmOntQ8fA/s320/DSC_0770.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354365856482835746" border="0" /></a>People begin to disperse.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibhBm4bkdRLgyt73x-5Sr6RyyoMaM_2Q8sdsZf58kdCsY5nsBFFZBm5VgB6t3uXqoeLtdqSgmErUUQMSJa3edjLeyHBE7qlxjAmKIMU9Y7F3nfOgASxlYYWF9m0z0xqm2tVbRY1OgvD2Y/s1600-h/DSC_0778.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 213px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibhBm4bkdRLgyt73x-5Sr6RyyoMaM_2Q8sdsZf58kdCsY5nsBFFZBm5VgB6t3uXqoeLtdqSgmErUUQMSJa3edjLeyHBE7qlxjAmKIMU9Y7F3nfOgASxlYYWF9m0z0xqm2tVbRY1OgvD2Y/s320/DSC_0778.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5354365852571788818" border="0" /></a>Kateri and Ozzie, in that order (left-to-right).Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12256607085558454970noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8819126854900793189.post-57847604102621380402009-07-01T16:29:00.010-05:002009-07-03T18:48:57.432-05:006/24 NATIONAL MUSEUM OF THE AMERICAN INDIAN [Washington, DC]And, suddenly, here it was: the end of the line. The last drop. The bitter end. The end credits. The bottom of the barrel. The final bow. The last of the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Mohicans</span>.<br /><br />Too far?<br /><br />The day was divided into three basic sections. I'm going to deal with each part briefly: as I said before, in many ways the Journey has already ended. Honestly, the day felt much less like a final verse -- rather, a coda. Also, as I am now home (hooray), I find myself <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">increasingly</span> anxious to move on; this is the most difficult that writing has been.<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Part One: Setup</span><br />The setup was, simply put, incredible. It was nice to be admitted into the Smithsonian atrium hours before it opened, and to be recognized by the guards as an important person (<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">wheee</span>!), but the real thrill was watching the other key members begin to fill the space. For the first hour, every person who entered was a familiar face from some previous stop. There's Joe and Hunter from Michigan; and there's Lonnie from <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Chemawa</span>; there's Jolene and her daughter, who we last saw in Idaho; the drummers from White Earth; singers from Mt. Pleasant; Horace and Ozzie, who saw us off on this Journey; Kitty and her crew from New Mexico -- and her crew from the East Coast, too; the little girl who sang with the drum group in <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">Carlisle</span>; and so many more: faces from around the nation who all gathered here today with a shared cause and a belief in healing.<br /><br />If I could walk away with only one emotion, it'd be whatever it was I was feeling at that moment. Some pride, yes, but more a sense of openly-bemused wonder as I discovered that my life was a TV show and I'd just wandered into the cast reunion episode -- or maybe a "best of" clip show.<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Part Two: The Ceremony</span><br /><br />Besides the familiar faces, there were any number of normal museum visitors who came and went throughout the day, making the crowd more fluid than any we'd seen before. That was to be expected, I suppose.<br /><br />Dr. Duran said something interesting from a linguistic point-of-view. In his theory, this level of white-on-red violence could only have been perpetrated by people of European-decent. The reason, he argued, is that Europeans have noun-based language and thinking patterns. This becomes crucial in <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">dehumanizing</span> the victims. If you're going to cut the fingers off a child, you must be able to see the child as an object, and the fingers as separate objects to remove. Otherwise, you simply couldn't go through with it.<br /><br />Most Indian languages, by contrast, are <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">fundamentally</span> verb-based. There is no word for "child," and the very concept is difficult to grasp; instead, you have a person who is "childing" - a process, a motion through time. The way we speak has a deep impact on the way we're able to think; most people who speak Native languages as a first tongue go naturally to "living" when faced with a child. The <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">objectification</span> of the "person"-noun never occurs. Violence on a European scale simply couldn't occur -- human nature would rebel against the orders without a way of distancing one's self.<br /><br />It's an interesting thought.<br /><br />The best part of the ceremony was at the very end, when people were invited to say their prayers for forgiveness in front of the Hoop. It was a magical moment -- the seats had been sparsely-filled only seconds ago; in the time it took me to reposition my camera, every seat was suddenly filled. I have no idea where these people came from. <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">Additionally</span>, the atrium was filling with people standing around the edges, looking in, and every balcony and staircase to the top of the building was packed with faces. I stress again that I don't know where these people came from; it was as close to science-fiction <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">materialization</span> as I expect to ever see.<br /><br /><object width="660" height="525"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/6rWUiGREV0Y&hl=en&fs=1&hd=1&border=1"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/6rWUiGREV0Y&hl=en&fs=1&hd=1&border=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="660" height="525"></embed></object><br />This is an extremely-rough cut, making it difficult to see the people on the balconies; they're too dark. They're there. And there's a lot of them.<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Part Three: Wrap-Up</span><br /><br />Wrap-up was strangely quiet. We had planned for some processing time, but Don was unable to get away from people asking questions and wanting a moment of his time. Eventually, Marlin ushered him out a back door to give him some time to himself. Maria was in charge of making sure that some of the guests made it to their hotels safely, and she left shortly afterward. Wayne and I cleaned up a little, then went to get gas for his car. We got horribly lost on the way.<br /><br />And this is the way the Journey ends: not with a bang but a whimper.<br /><br />We never got that debriefing time, and we scattered our separate ways to head back to our different states. I guess this is the way of things; Don is apparently already knee-deep in planning for a series of community-grief ceremonies, and Marlin and Wayne are likely to be assisting him in various ways. There's an awful lot of work left to be done in the world, and I think it's time for me to be back home, knowing I helped a little bit with one small piece.<br /><br />--<br />edit: <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">Unfortunately</span>, due mostly to Iran, the White House was pretty well booked up with <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">responsibilities</span>. In the end, no one arrived to accept our petition. Its time will come, however.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12256607085558454970noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8819126854900793189.post-75994141016729204082009-06-28T22:24:00.002-05:002009-06-28T22:28:11.068-05:00America TownIn some ways, the Journey is over. Well, that is, our part of the Journey is over. The neat thing about this is the feeling that it will keep going on in various places in different ways long after we've gone back to real life. But our piece might have finished in Carlisle.<br /><br />But we said we'd end in Washington, and that's our plan. The last event is scheduled for the atrium of the Smithsonian, where we hope to present the petition to a White House representative. We'll see how that goes: I turned on the news that night for the first time in over a week. Apparently, our arrival coincided with the worst train crash in Washington history, a sharp outbreak of violence in Iran, and threats from North Korea. My chance to fist-bump Obama seems to have dimmed a little.<br /><br />Since the Smithsonian is not known for being a boarding school, I think this last event will be more of a celebration and wrap-up. We'll see.<br /><br /><br />We arrived a day early to make sure all arrangements were finalized. Suddenly having a day without driving or filming was shockingly jarring. I spent the whole day in a daze, feeling like I was leaving something important undone. I chose not to look around the city much; this was due to a combination of being worn out, being already overstimulated, and not having transportation. The van might have made its last lousy turn: trying to park it in an underground garage, I got it wedged between the floor and the ceiling. I'd say the sign they've got that says, "Maximum Height" is off by about an inch and a half. Until they fix the sign, I think I'll just leave a van there to remind people.<br /><br />edit: Wayne got the van unstuck, doing yet further damage to it. He often mentions that it might have been cheaper to just buy me a vehicle. Sadly, he might be right. We won't be taking the van to the Smithsonian tomorrow morning, as neither of us dares to try to park it again.<br /><br /><br />Patrick (little brother) also arrived in Washington at about the same time. He's volunteered to help out with the final event, and to drive half of the way home. This is wonderful news, as I'm about done driving, and it'll be nice to share this event with someone I'll see again.<br /><br />Speaking of which, I feel like we're rapidly heading towards a remake of "The Breakfast Club." You know the sense where the weeny one says something like, "We're still gonna be friends after this, right?" and the answer is no? Once this is done, Marlin's going to go back to being the secretly lonely jock, Wayne's going to be the science fair nerd, Maria will be the girl, I'm going to be Emilo Estevez, and Don will be Don Corleone.<br /><br />Kateri, Don's daughter, also arrived. She's been the voice on the other end of the HQ telephone and organized all our hotel rooms, credit card procurement, coordinator coordination, and the like. She seems really organized and almost immediately started telling Wayne what to do. As he's been the taskmaster so far, I had a little twinge of unfair and perverse delight at seeing him get orders. I say unfair, because he's been really good about getting us where we need to be and making sure we're doing the right things. I imagine his job is akin to herding cats, some days, and he's done well.<br /><br />In the interests of saving money and not sleeping on the curb, Patrick and I shared the crummy little bed in the hotel. That's not something we need to do, ever again; and if we must, I'd use a mattress with at least one spring. And I'd put it in a room with air conditioning.<br /><br />The Hotel Harrington, Washington: Now With Bars of Soap in the Sink!<br /><br />I'm afraid that's the best product placement I can manage right now. It's going to be a big day tomorrow.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12256607085558454970noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8819126854900793189.post-31946263700088177612009-06-21T23:36:00.003-05:002009-06-28T22:23:50.129-05:006/21 CARLISLE INDIAN SCHOOL [Pennsylvania]<img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 213px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 320px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5352575328832926546" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUpMdUEwqnG76BKDGpJAZnUpKMYdAESDyzWTU8pQs9HpMVfxkhxRqo0LHhSf9-yoD9hSGrbL_zDMwPGsR_jpX-fjxZt4WGa3U0ZHE7ZRbQMpo1JtX9A7onhWGJifmQHhqozocUyhj0xQU/s320/DSC_0192.JPG" /><br />The morning opened with the usual compliment of hassles. We were given a nice ballroom-type room to use, just off of (what I think was) the barracks. The sound system was supposedly disconnected for repairs, necessitating the unpacking of our own equipment. The ceiling-mounted projector still worked, but the only connection it offered was a small port hidden near the baseboard in back of the room. This meant that to use the projector would put the computer out of the range of Don's wireless slideshow-clicker, and too far back to access the speakers. So we started setting up and calibrating our own equipment for that, too.<br /><br />I say that the sound system was supposedly disconnected because there woman in charge of the building was pretty put out that we were there at all, and wasn't too subtle about it. Marlin overheard her making what he described as "racist comments" and she was incredibly annoyed when I asked for help finding the projector connection. When we'd looked at the space last night, it was being used to host a wedding reception that clearly had some form of sound system. If hooking up the microphones merely involved flipping a switch, I wouldn't be surprised if she neglected to mention it.<br /><br />She'll be mentioned again, so let's give her a name. How about... Mrs. Pants?<br /><br /><br />The ballroom, now set up with tables and fancy glasses, began filling up nicely. Raven started the day off, using her unique position as a non-military resident of the complex: "I'm just a spouse, so no one can stop me. I'm not going to lie!" (Teddy, her husband, is some kind of officer and might have limits placed on what he can say.) Raven emphasized the amount of pre-planning Pratt did before starting the school. He knew that it would be important to objectify and dehumanize the children, and knew the psychological importance of uniforms, cutting hair, and renaming. The very first building that was constructed was the prison for runaways. Once that building was constructed, he began his legal kidnapping -- every other new building was built by the children. In short, they were slave laborers used to build their own nightmare.<br /><br />A note on the cutting of hair, which remains a major grievance to this day. It can be hard to imagine the importance of this act; personally, my white perspective led me to simply disregard it for the first week or so. "Hey, free haircut," I said. Actually, the cutting of hair was a three-pronged attack. First, it made the children look alike and thus made it easier for the teachers to accept inhumane orders: you weren't hurting a specific child, just one of those innumerable Indians. The second prong was aimed at specific tribes: it was a cultural mandate that hair only be cut during times of extreme grieving. I have heard that some people follow this to this day, shaving their heads if a family member dies and under no other circumstances so much as trimming bangs. The forced haircuts acted both as a well-recognized violation and as a way of insisting that their previous lives were "dead." Abandon all hope, ye who enter here. The final prong was targeted at some woodland tribes, who used hair braiding as a spiritual lesson and meditation, not unlike the Christian rosary. As it was explained to me, strands of hair are somehow identified as representing either the body, mind, or soul. Only when all three are weaved together is strength obtained. This familiar lesson and meditative activity might have been a source of support to children, even while their actual bodies, minds, and souls were under assault; but Pratt was canny and had learned a lot about Native beliefs while fighting in the Indian Wars.<br /><br /><br />Raven also pointed out a nearby building that was the school's punishment house; it, too, had been constructed by unwilling children. (Ashburn House? My notes are unclear). She advised against checking it out if you believe in any form of lingering energy, karma, or space-memory. "Can you imagine," she asked, what must be left behind in "an entire building used for nothing but punishment?" I think I must have grown jaded by the stories I've been hearing; it took Raven's question to make me step back and realize how odd it is to have an entire punishment building. This was no side corner, or chair turned to face the wall in a classroom. Pratt knew he'd need a multi-story structure just to handle the endless waves of beatings.<br /><br />They were children.<br /><br />How could an adult do these things to a child? How can the teachers go home, have dinner with their families, kiss their kids goodnight, then get up in the morning to do it all over again the next day? What made that okay?<br /><br />Pratt also realized the importance of keeping the children from trusting each other; from the first day, all punishments were chosen by other students, and no one was punished harder than a student who had chosen an insufficient punishment for a peer.<br /><br />Raven ended by talking about her own past in the boarding school. She's not particulalry old -- certainly no more than 50 and likely less -- and still talked about being taken unwillingly from her family and held until she was considered tamed; she was not released from her boarding school until she was 19. She spent most of her life hating her mother for sending her to school; only recently did she find out the true story. Even within her lifetime, the government was still abducting Indians, just more subtly. Her mother was served papers saying that her children would be taken to "Indian schools" unless she appeared in court to say that their education was already provided for. The papers were served the same day as the court hearing. The court she was required to appear in was 1,000 miles away, and she owned no form of transportation other than shoes. The next day, she lost legal custody of her children -- that part of the process, at least, was done timely. The situation was never explained to the little girl being pushed into a strange car by strange men, and Raven hated her mother for decades almost as much as she hated the school.<br /><br />Her goal in life is to make sure that this kind of treatment never happens to any of her children or their babies. That part that's most stunning about that statement is the reinforcement of the idea that this is happening right now. Today. The corrupt boarding schools of old are no longer in operation, but the world is full of people in June of 2009 who remember them personally and worry that they could return.<br /><br /><p><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5352578634263777506" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjUnm8-zEe54Z3dnmB3WmSz8npc15BkKsqn7nS6Z8LGd9QRD2NOImAkBsWNbm2UvvOEwAkyZMv7mOjz5nGD347p5doL5ulPENX3BpHrd3fbB9EIG7tSh25BL8NE3DE4ZUkFqWYKt3zm3Vs/s320/DSC_0089.JPG" /></p><p>The rest of the morning went as per usual; and lunch was particularly enjoyable because our table quickly filled up with people wanting a moment of Don's time. The woman who had taken the prized seat right next to him seemed content just to listen, however. Finally, someone asked </p><p>if she had any questions or comments; she guiltily admitted that she'd accidentally walked in a few minutes ago and saw that there was a free lunch and everyone seemed to be eating. Her acquisition of the most sought-after chair in the room was due to a fluke: it was the first seat she saw when she walked in the room. I thought it was pretty funny, and Don seemed to appreciate finally sitting next to someone who would just let him eat his lunch. </p><p>Kitty also joined us at lunch. I somehow haven't mentioned her before, but she's showed up periodically throughout the journey. As I understand it, she's making a documentary about health disparities in minority communities. Every once in a while, she shows up and films an event. Today I got my first real sense of how driven she is; she long-ago realized I was the lowest-ranked member of the Journey totem pole. Despite the fact that we sat next to each other, she tuned out everything I said in the hopes of getting a good sound byte from someone important. I left a little miffed.<br /></p><p>After lunch, someone talked about the "classes" that Pratt first instituted to justify calling his empire a "school." There were two classes, one for each gender. Girls learned to be servants, boys learned to load and clean cannons. That was it. </p><p>One woman apologized that her brother refused to attend. He is an elder of some standing, but he long-ago refused to ever forgive the school. When he was a young boy, the school decided to expand their gym facilities, which meant building over a burial ground. Some children were forced to do the construction; others, including himself, were made to dig up the bodies and relocate them by hand. Decades of nightmares have solidified his resolve to curse Carlisle until his dying day; he would not come today. </p><p>If you remember, Gentle Reader, we had an elder named Ozzie travelling with us for the first day or two of the Journey, way back when. He returned today to see us through to the end. It was about this time that I really started realizing how great he really is: a good speaker, a kind heart, and a good sense of humor, all back up the tremendous strength he has gained from overcoming personal obstacles and alcohol. As he tells it, the best result of his service in the Korean War is that he could use his uniform to get admitted to bars and other public locations. Without that, Indians were immediately shown the door. No, their money wasn't good enough. Only as a veteran could he take part in public life. </p><p><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5352578644873299218" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZKbBAYE6wUpnrNGxPzpt0umJKZsHcry3p6vIbMZUua1i1xvqK9g5aZW4-kE_CEapAGtjq8qntM26vP8vOAw1A4Q1mEmSGHpHczG2a6KLpiIsmOvmNZcx9KQzrS0gvzW-UTuBCsMe8ABo/s320/DSC_0016.JPG" /><br />He also told a great joke about "a friend of his" staggering away from a bar late at night. His shoes were untied, and he had one foot on the sidewalk and one in the gutter, slowly hobbling forward. Suddenly a policeman appeared and said, "I'm sorry, sir, you'll have to come with me. You're clearly drunk." In response, the man burst into tears and ran forward to hug the policeman. "Thank you, thank you! I thought I was a cripple!" </p><p>If you somehow get the chance in your life to hear Ozzie tell it, I recommend it. </p><p>It happened to be fathers' day, and Ozzie ended his piece with a plea to fathers. He acknowledged how difficult it can be to show love or affection, particularly for men whose emotional growth had been purposely stunted -- either by schools or by parents damaged by schools. It's been one of his greatest battles in his own life, and he stressed how critical it is for every father to learn how to be affectionate. I can hardly imagine this goodhearted man being anything but kind, but I guess that just means that he won his fight and came out stronger for it.<br />One person got up and tearfully said that their grandmother didn't have any fingers; it had never once been discussed and they had only realized today that it wasn't a birth defect -- it was a punishment earned at school. Perhaps you remember the story of the woman from Minnesota; apparently that punishment had a precedent at Carlisle. </p><p>Sometimes, there's nothing more painful than connecting the dots that you never wanted to.<br /></p><p>We also learned today that Carlisle set another precedent: the "crying tree." Apparently, students at many schools would secretly find a hidden tree that would be designated as the crying tree. It was a place to hide and vent your feelings, and it was a sacred trust. No matter the punishments or the rewards for snitching, no one ever betrayed someone sneaking away to the tree. It was a place without teasing or judgment, where kids of all ages went to weep until their last tear was spent.<br /></p><p>One young woman stood up during the open mic and shared an unusual story. She wasn't Native, but felt that she could understand. At 15, her behavior was so far out of control that her mother signed her up for a behavior-modification center. It was supposed to be psychologically soothing, but as soon as the doors closed on the van, she was handcuffed and taken to a grim facility where the sound of screams echoed at night and rumors of sexual abuse were widespread. After two weeks, she was handcuffed again and sent to another facility in Costa Rica where physical punishment increased exponentially. She was denied permission to call home and her letters were torn up. She said she didn't know much about the boarding schools, but she knew was it was to be distrustful, to be imprisoned, to be scared, to be hurt. </p><p>It's possible that her story might have holes; after all, she WAS sent in for severe behavior modification. But even so, the fact that a parallel can be drawn so easily between the treatment of ordinary Indian children at school and the treatment of disturbed youth sent to brainwashing centers is striking, irregardless of the details of her story. After all, we've really been talking about prison camps all along, and treatment that would be innapropriate for criminals, much less little kids. </p><p>And the damage is clear. An elder woman showed her vulnerability by sadly reflecting: "We grew up not loving ourselves, because there was no one...[inaudible]." The tears drowned out the end of her thought. Another woman remembers how her mother sat down one day and taught her brother which graves to spit on. Many of the graves contained people who had died generations before, like President Andrew Jackson. This story, besides being a clear example of anger passing from parent to child, shows how long that poisonous hate can last -- she hated people who died before she was born, a hatred she must have gotten from her own parents. </p><p> <img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5352578630396383874" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiawynKdumC_38RUOHXnZ-LAcGSqQcVNnChNlgOxEZSmtrdj7RqQ8D6jY7P-ZFHFYsQGUEE9BwhXL0Xb5Q0pkjy6zOBP-e0KLrFMDlWAHAUfpqNvCBeGEkqTqLkk_DEyBk5zx7jNz-K8Mg/s320/DSC_0128.JPG" /><br />The day ended with a walk to the cemetery: over 175 dead children whose bodies they never sent home. Historical markers peppered the road and paths the whole way; all dealing with the military heroes who had lived or trained here. The only mention of the Indian School I saw was a single plaque commemorating the athletic achievements of student Jim Thorpe, who won double golds in the Olympics. One wall of a building was devoted to the names and pictures of people associated with Carlisle. All were men, and Jim Thorpe was the only non-white person. </p><p><br /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5352578640257342946" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgx4HuYuHwojwykkYJGz4MGefsRykiUlo2OGcNETMA7zNcS_dzU-sWXJB5VHq3m0vnXgBuvKGEinD0-34tBHKgNIi4ZCBl0lUvCMI8ynXta1-rs5KXuLeuXdiO7WYdns8dzLhTi6FSdzaQ/s320/DSC_0078.JPG" /></p><p>The local drum group escorted us over, carrying the big drum by straps and always playing. This is the only female drum group I have seen on our Journey; in fact, it is the only time I have ever seen an Indian woman play anything other than a hand drum. When I asked about this, someone wistfully told me that it was not the original way: gender roles are important in traditional society. However, since the local elders have all moved on without passing on the old teachings, tradition is changing. Everywhere, Indian culture is making a resurgence, but it's also more in flux than it's ever been -- some of the old ways have simply been lost, and there are voids which are being filled in with new ideas; thus, the women's drum that played the old songs for us. I leave it up to the individual reader to decide how this time of charge should be approached: some are wistful, some are hopeful, many fall somewhere in between.<br /></p><p>Kitty's right-hand man, Aaron, did his best to interrupt the final ceremony in his quest for the perfect shot. Even though I was as annoyed as anyone else, I was also a little jealous. He seemed to be getting some good shots. I've gotten the hang of getting shots while staying the heck out of the way, but it'd be nice to get a close-up like his once in a while. But not to behave like him. </p><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5352578626486439570" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiR-_5oopuftYpvI68qxXPd9VIZarzykKLAMxrPTDOY6xT2hfW4vyTT4b95ATm92weiVZGYfh3YaBGnNmUP9Pp09UaU5jTJOuZXsO3gvXtM_3MNfyhot9lJI5MpVzorzqpztMQfJ55rRBA/s320/DSC_0144.JPG" /> <p>In the cemetery, Maria reported finding 8 graves in a row marked "Unknown." </p><p>There's not much I can say about the final ceremony in the Carlisle graveyard. It was the most moving graveyard service we've done, and the pains unearthed are some of the oldest and deepest-rooted ones in the Native American psyche. I'm hoping my video can do more justice than my words, but I doubt it: it was a beautiful moment and the tears shed under the central tree might do more good than anything else we've said or done.<br /> <br />As we were packing up, Mrs. Pants appeared again. She left her work behind to took us aside and humbly thank us for coming. Today, we did good.<br /></p><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjf8D-nlAKGlG3jy671ZrNEmYqYJTuQn-0DV3ZR3Pf9tQZOCDu2EsD25NxcHYID-wjh-8Tb17EsbJ55IyCUiquZvcaqEwaPnHXw0ZiCIrkWTJeCsX176SoXWRSo57l5iF1KjROGOgWAfFw/s1600-h/DSC_0155.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5352575347634882018" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjf8D-nlAKGlG3jy671ZrNEmYqYJTuQn-0DV3ZR3Pf9tQZOCDu2EsD25NxcHYID-wjh-8Tb17EsbJ55IyCUiquZvcaqEwaPnHXw0ZiCIrkWTJeCsX176SoXWRSo57l5iF1KjROGOgWAfFw/s320/DSC_0155.JPG" /></a><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhvk7ylCkufGtSNAayahVBxeYT6YbH-7FV2ie8Y37mgE7YYeG7REmUEpHn5nhvrGelRcE19m35qALGYBruGbMCy-p4wx2qTNK93dUb0iNch0ftfFQ9IEdXZ6BZ18wf9SAIzuj1SkU9L7xA/s1600-h/DSC_0162.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5352575342386045218" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhvk7ylCkufGtSNAayahVBxeYT6YbH-7FV2ie8Y37mgE7YYeG7REmUEpHn5nhvrGelRcE19m35qALGYBruGbMCy-p4wx2qTNK93dUb0iNch0ftfFQ9IEdXZ6BZ18wf9SAIzuj1SkU9L7xA/s320/DSC_0162.JPG" /></a><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSANZbw4gzf7np5I2f2vBxUYlc79IyoEojqEitOtDf6RUusxBdeH5HQIHa-WPq7eSIKARCiB870vdJ-5QxxuVKcfDGOuUAbkIPs6_QNTVRyFTfzLQwvGalo49HlKISaif4AWiRDYVlE7g/s1600-h/DSC_0179.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 213px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 320px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5352575339576011074" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSANZbw4gzf7np5I2f2vBxUYlc79IyoEojqEitOtDf6RUusxBdeH5HQIHa-WPq7eSIKARCiB870vdJ-5QxxuVKcfDGOuUAbkIPs6_QNTVRyFTfzLQwvGalo49HlKISaif4AWiRDYVlE7g/s320/DSC_0179.JPG" /></a><br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipDmMOJRbXXz5hX05Z0H_EdOgze007_lcnihQ9VF5BZ5OVE9aMS8ETwlJyDB7lQrLf6A6Scy0zWBI5w2UGlp9Hidgq27A5YJmDb8x51-P5jB7Wd3bV5Q5I7Of3Okv2BUyCwkcSPgJ9IvE/s1600-h/DSC_0205.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5352575325455939698" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEipDmMOJRbXXz5hX05Z0H_EdOgze007_lcnihQ9VF5BZ5OVE9aMS8ETwlJyDB7lQrLf6A6Scy0zWBI5w2UGlp9Hidgq27A5YJmDb8x51-P5jB7Wd3bV5Q5I7Of3Okv2BUyCwkcSPgJ9IvE/s320/DSC_0205.JPG" /></a>Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12256607085558454970noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8819126854900793189.post-75722412529782509342009-06-21T23:34:00.002-05:002009-06-27T20:50:40.067-05:00PleasantvilleAs we approached our final stop, everything changed.<br /><br />Captain Richard Pratt was a hero of the Indian wars. Left in charge of a large group of POWs, he seized upon a plan no one had considered before. The military had shown him that the best way to create a good solider was to break young men down with physical exertion, stress, and being yelled at while crawling through mud. What if those same methods were applied to Indians? Could they be reduced to bare humanity, then built back up as whites?<br /><br />And so he began experimenting on POWs -- a sentence which probably is just as messed up as it sounds. When he felt he'd perfected his methods of reprogramming, he had a vision of the next logical step: if this procedure were applied to every single Indian, their race would finally be essentially exterminated.<br /><br />But, as the wars had shown him, Indians were fierce and determined. Demoralizing and destroying the POWs had been difficult -- too difficult to try to repeat on a large scale.<br />The solution was to leave the warriors be: the ideal target was children under 10. Maybe, if action was swift and encompassing enough, the entire Indian bloodline could be converted into a nation of domestic servants and laborers within just a few generations. America would have an entire ethnic subculture of neo-slaves.<br /><br />In 1879, Pratt received funding from the Department of War and governmental permission to begin seizing children and testing his methods; he founded Carlisle Indian School in Pennsylvania.<br /><br /><br />Our entire Journey has been a quest from the farthest reaches of the country, coming ever closer to the place where it all began. Ground Zero of a cultural genocide. Carlisle.<br /><br /><br />For the first several weeks, we expected Carlisle to be a large and powerful gathering. The buildings are still present, but they have been remade as a war college.<br /><br />(Side note: Carlisle was set to become the premier war college in the United States; but, at the last minute, a crucial funding bill was rewritten and given to West Point. West Point has held that honor ever since.)<br /><br />Then, for the last week, we started to expect Carlisle to be a disastrous stop. The paperwork for our presence started to be denied, the administrators became cold and dismissive, and we couldn't get clear answers over the phone anymore. Most critically, we felt it was important to end the Journey with a healing ceremony in the graveyard: the final resting place of almost 200 children and babies, including Lucy Prettyeagle, the first child ever killed in boarding school. The administration reluctantly gave us a concession: we could say a prayer in the graveyard, but only 8 people could attend.<br /><br />This actually became partially my problem, as I looked for ways to get cameras into the graveyard and webcast the prayer live, something I've never tried to do before. We felt that visiting the children's graves was too important to do in secret.<br /><br /><br />And, standing on Carlisle's doorstep, we picked up some divine intervention in the form of a couple that dropped out of the sky. Raven had heard about White Bison indirectly, and only accidentally learned of our plan to visit Carlisle by curious web-surfing a few days before. She quickly convinced her husband, Teddy, that they needed to help. In almost no time at all, they used their influence to slice through the red tape and arrange nearly everything.<br /><br />Through them, we received military passes to get past the gates. And, although the graveyard remained closed to non-military personnel, Raven carefully explained that every single attendee -- however many there may be -- would be a personal guest staying at her home on-base. As invited guests staying more than one day under her care, they would have more-or-less free access to large portions of the grounds, including the cemetary.<br /><br /><br />This is, as best as I can tell, divine intervention; and, thus, a good sign that we're doing the right thing. There are Native beliefs I don't understand, and a few things I don't agree with, but there's no real question that Don is doing holy work.<br /><br />And so, with no time left remaining, the path to Carlisle was suddenly cleared for us.<br /><br /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5352188924167927026" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjPQQHtKLpnsYZlUpEp3BBG2unus1u9Caao5MUiQ58vnEw1v0QDdbfQ0bd9b1O0kgqNmFJg2br_ZYTvghwdsZeaMW_XFx7B231aJvHbUECg1JGcg-i8vbkyTjEEQSs9UpHquI0LaouCHI/s320/DSC_0589.JPG" /><br />The night we arrived, Raven and Teddy invited us to a backyard barbeque held at their friends' house. We drove past military structures of brick and stone; then we took a sharp turn and suddenly found ourselves in a street taken directly from the 1950s. Little rows of similar houses stared blankly at each other across the street, trees lined the little green rectangle set aside in the center, and a little metal slide waited for kids to climb its carefully-polished ladder. The Good Humor man wasn't there that instant, but surely he was just around the corner with a non-threatening smile and frozen treats that could be yours for a shiny dime.<br /><br />The BBQ was great. I had two hamburgers, then watched the kids play Deadspace for a while. If I weren't happily full of beef, I might wonder about the perception of violence that comes from growing up surrounded by military leaders hard at work, then playing extraordinarily graphic games for entertainment. But I'm full, so I'll just say that I wish I had Deadspace. I miss video games.<br /><br />As we were leaving, Marlin clapped me on the back and complimented me on how much fortitude I've gained during this Journey; once, I was catching cat naps at every gas station and interacting with the world through a veil of blurry fatigue. Now, I'm at least kind of alert some of the time. I thanked him, drew up a list of the projects I hoped to get done before morning, then fell asleep fully clothed at the hotel. Oh, well.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12256607085558454970noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8819126854900793189.post-4895306801444785412009-06-21T23:33:00.007-05:002009-06-26T23:53:35.639-05:006/19 THOMAS INDIAN SCHOOL [Gowanda, New York]<img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5351832344287967186" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhW9A8oz6KafK-nLI37gs-BzrdcEUmaZOi9ktDXnQ3V62WnP-BdEE962wsW80yykQYmczofxwKXpjlXhnCNYUZKSDt-arYH0mn7fcoucIzV5fARMhGuYfRFqN1wPyFPbsqfuKjh0BDcB0I/s320/DSC_0499.JPG" /><br />I've only been in New York once before; I had an extended layover at the airport. I thought, perhaps, I could go check out the sights and pick up some <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">souvenirs</span> while I was there; instead, I ended up falling asleep on a bench in the airport. I imagine sleeping on a bench sums up at least some of the New York experience.<br /><br /><br />More recently: The drive through the New York state was notably different than the flight through New York City. The highway system appears to be composed of nothing but windy back roads through forested, hilly areas. Overall, it looks a little like Michigan or Wisconsin, but more faded around the edges. It's pastoral without brilliant colors.<br /><br /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5351826440383228786" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZIFRkzhTQPA_vDCLEKk3ypNIxMardeYn8qDZhkSFo-CM5hyphenhyphenw_OZqv1bW9AqbMLNzxjHihnixO6Pc7AS5nQuGKKchaXum6p_HDCseFmMJxGqMe99LkfqjJUozT4SYpcy_VDjI_8ykFUzs/s320/DSC_0561.JPG" /><br />On reaching <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-error">Gowanda</span>, we drove straight to the clinic where the coordinators worked. Their goal in promoting this event is promotion of community mental health, and they were glad to see us. We discussed the upcoming event a little, but the conversation got sidetracked by stories of how unpleasant the clinic is and how often staff members die.<br /><br />As a piece of background information, the clinic had been built over a burial ground. If Hollywood has taught me anything, it's that there are four buildings you should never put on Indian burial grounds: homes, hospitals, pet shops, and hotels. I think a clinic is close enough to 'hospital' to put it in the danger zone.<br /><br />What followed was, I think, an exorcism.<br /><br />Actually, whatever it was that we did (it involved feathers and a bell and smoke) differed from an exorcism in at least one important way. In an exorcism, it's a direct conflict between a human and a supernatural agent. They fight, and one is destroyed. (disclaimer: my understanding of the <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">procedure</span> comes mostly from The Exorcist III: Legion)<br /><br />The feel here was friendlier; inviting any lost spirits to come home. No one wants to hang around a clinic, anyways: here's an open door for you.<br /><br />This was one of the stranger adventures. Personally, I'd be surprised if a bell made the clinic suddenly better; but if everyone shows up for work tomorrow believing things are improved, that's bound to make it a more pleasant place to be. In that way, I'm sure we helped.<br /><br />That said, my mantra for this Journey still holds true: "There are more things in Heaven and Earth..." What the heck do I know, anyways?<br /><br /><br />The next day saw me get a late start out of bed. The bizarre little hotel we stayed in neglected to provide any clocks, and my cell phone ran out of juice during the night. I say "bizarre" not just because of the oddly-shaped rooms and obvious widespread mildew, but because the owners clearly were hedging their bets about how best to make a buck. This was possibly the world's only combination hotel/lounge/restaurant/karate academy. I dare you to find me one other than in <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-error">Gowanda</span>, New York.<br /><br /><br />In the parking lot, I met an early arrival who spent the day trying to get an autographed picture of Don to go with his autographed book. I tried to help a time or two, but you have to admit that it would be pretty creepy if any of us traveled around the country with a stack of <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_4" class="blsp-spelling-error">pre</span>-printed photographs of our boss. After a certain number of weeks, human relationships just don't work that way.<br /><br /><br />The person slated to wire the microphones didn't show up, so I bowed out of the outside march-to-the-site so I could tinker with sound. The plan was to walk from the public library to a wing of the clinic constructed on the grounds of the old boarding school. My focus on equipment was not, I guess, appropriate: Marlin drove up looking for me and communicated via frantic hand gestures that I should leave whatever I was doing and go take pictures.<br /><br />This is not the type of situation in which I work best, and in my hurry to get into Marlin's car I left behind my "shoe," a small but important piece of plastic that holds a video camera onto a tripod. I realized it was missing once I was at the library, and I tried to run there and back before the procession started.<br /><br />If you've ever spent any real amount of time with me, you know what happened next. I got horribly lost. Luckily, the moment I left the library door, Wayne inferred both what was happening and what was going to happen; it took only a few minutes before his car caught up with my headlong plunge in the wrong direction. He drove me the rest of the way. Thanks.<br /><br />The whole adventure turned out to be for naught, however, as the batteries on the camcorder gasped their last soon after I turned it on. The constant draining and recharging that they've been put through the last few weeks have all but destroyed all four of the lithium-ion packs I purchased. The wear and tear on equipment is really starting to add up; this will be a much more expensive trip than I planned. There's a lot that I'm just going to have to replace when I get home. In the meantime, I can't count on using my cameras without direct access to AC plug-ins. At least I got some stills.<br /><br /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5351832339489059218" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKE2J2EFEOvmSzFjrgTuikxTYROz7ZBsnNzobThKIUoVS5TVrArlBWFnMdTv0Piyg6W-9kynolrnjd1IgzdouULG0pIpnIpxSQm46JAqHStJ8wK3RHGTODRkEmtI3aezHlqslGWIbnaAs/s320/DSC_0529.JPG" /><br /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5351832333786240322" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQ7q_c60N0lr1n_i1ovLpvuD7tLscXMQIHaAjN1WmVTKmUMU6eimuyK3gXcLYy7zMDu98KxyBThiGRx1j-Di8E7_QPN9x5UqLe4C0ScEsjODhLltDc1D1kKaLmmLsvSD-vNXIOel5W0gE/s320/DSC_0531.JPG" /><br /><br /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5351832329651386594" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1_QgZjOE6iU3uCdN_091DNtTRNswn_elFbMudK0ttP5wc5aVBiG3Myh3y19szf9kJiLb_huC3jroD_jSIyXWynyU_KLfWnaMx4fYs0AbBr4eeJlnSEQMtkxAlNYrW-wEAoIUjslBJZMc/s320/DSC_0533.JPG" /><br />After the opening speakers finished, it became clear that my <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_5" class="blsp-spelling-error">microphonery</span> had been inadequate -- thanks to problems in the building's wiring I couldn't have anticipated and hadn't previously had time to test. Although the speaker was, technically, amplified, her words were still inaudible in most of the room and raising the volume on the mic caused it to move directly into wild distortion. To fix the problem, I executed what may have been my very best set-up operation. <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_6" class="blsp-spelling-error">NASCAR</span> had nothing on me. I had our own speaker system brought in, set up, wired, and running in half the time it took at any other location.<br /><br />Oh, man. I re-read that sentence and realized how proud I am about setting up speaker cables quickly. <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_7" class="blsp-spelling-error">Geez</span>. No wonder I'm single.<br /><br />Anyways, foolishly proud of myself, I left the newly-<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_8" class="blsp-spelling-error">mic'd</span> podium behind to see if any local businesses had donated snacks (this sometimes happens). Like most places, they had bottles of water available for people; unlike anywhere else, however, they also had little packets of powder for people. With a few seconds of shaking, you could have your very own personal bottle of fruit punch, lemonade, or berry juice. What a great, great idea!<br /><br /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5351826448194794738" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBt9VlRKJClHRIXHvFC1MXuXV96lXZsNG1L2Ux3FGQOD0ORukfcYf9YUcocE618TeQXZss_HMSW7JCTAlUbLrQsRFc7im-qkgRU0hfuyhTM8I-xzNddUXCsCFhaqlxuaGEJqSSJJx6b98/s320/DSC_0545.JPG" /><br />The morning went fine after that.<br /><br />If I had to condense the afternoon into a single theme, I'd have to go with: "Thomas Indian School was okay for me, because it was an escape from my alcoholic parents who couldn't afford to feed their kids." The dark irony here, as I'm sure I've written about elsewhere, is that those parents wouldn't have been abusive alcoholics if they hadn't learned that behavior themselves at Thomas Indian school. When the disease is hailed as its own cure... no wonder the community is sick.<br /><br /><br />Even while people were grateful that they'd been fed as children, there was still a lot of resentment. The school had been a big supporter of the 'outing' system, in which children 'learn by doing.' This sounds like such a great idea, but it devolved into nothing more than child labor. One man vividly related his years of getting up at 5 AM every day to bale hay. For those not familiar with farm life, baling hay is not a terribly time-sensitive job. So, he worked for a white family for a few years for no pay and little food; but at least he learned a valuable on-the-job skill -- provided he hoped to go into a career of baling hay and nothing else.<br /><br />A woman spent every summer being 'outed,' and she had no qualms today about calling herself a slave. She ended up at the same farm with a rotating group of other Indian girls, working the fields for long hours every day. The farm family had a daughter of their own, the same age: "their natural daughter [. . .] never set foot in the fields."<br /><br />Another man remembered the school's policy on brushing teeth. If, at bedtime, your teeth weren't perfectly white, the punishment is that you'd be held while a teacher brushed your teeth until blood was clearly visible. He ended his story with a sardonic: "But I learned how to brush my teeth!" which got a few laughs.<br /><br />Quote: "Everywhere you went... it was <em>marching</em>."<br /><br />One young lady's grandmother was permanently blinded in one eye with an iron poker. Once, I would have thought the teacher <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_9" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">disciplining</span> her had made a terrible mistake. Now, I immediately entertain the idea that it was completely intentional. My thinking about the world has changed, and that gives me pause. But then again, how many innocent forms of discipline can you think of that involve an iron poker and a little girl's face?<br /><br />Yet more men talked about going straight from school into the military. "I thought the military was the easiest thing there was!" No amount of control was seen as <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_10" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">unusual</span>; no order was questioned. Violence was second-nature.<br /><br /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5351826458157069250" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgj2VwEvozZi99YPYVChrkU9q3Jbiwbnn3SMMW315QT9YSlytccxvV_-4sCfqR_iaW5hnsnA29Zxd4TpH1Do0WNUASJGwgWMWrtHIsbvGfcv0gMFmwDSrN2cBwXbeoTtfweDANLQ3E2_Oc/s320/DSC_0536.JPG" /><br />And even with all the grievances, almost everyone at this stop said that going to school was still better than being left at home.<br /><br /><br />Their parents had no idea how to raise children, and struggled with their own scarred psyches through self-medication. And then their kids went off to school and grew up with scarred psyches and no idea how to raise children, but a vague appreciation that the school had saved them.<br /><br />Many people talked about the shame they felt about having no idea how to be a parent to their children, and many confessed to a lifetime of "cold" relationships. The ability to form a meaningful connection with another person had been squelched after being continually thwarted during their formative years. One man put it nicely when he said: "No school teaches intimacy, or love. Parents teach that. And they took us away from our parents!" <br />And that brings up a fundamental problem with the whole concept of the boarding school, even the "good" upper-class English style. There's a reason why every successful culture in history has had some form of family unit. Some things can never be learned from a textbook, and many lessons can never be <em>beaten</em> into someone. Families are necessary; when removed from the equation, there's a kind of education that is forever lacking.<br /><br />In the words of one man, "here at the school, you were <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_11" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">SEPARATED</span>." His older sister went to the same school. Thanks to the careful oversight of his teachers, he didn't know who she was until he was in his teens.<br /><br />One older woman revealed the emotional scars she's carried her entire life from never being told about puberty: she had no one to turn to. In a world where every action might potentially lead to harsh, violent discipline, she hid her body's changes in desperate fear and confusion. To this day, it pains her to remember those years.<br /><br /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5351826441679904066" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgF8W9EareXSqQQR36BYBOw57tXTDWFmDuGyT8bbxfX85GYo39cMxCIzg5I0D4AyUpmE3oEzxeryHo9zFhs3rVjPOAmrQgN_MrQZt_fqXYbvBxvwUVE-7IdRk0B5aqyu3cEI8hdhlvvX1o/s320/DSC_0554.JPG" />The last few speakers all touched on the theme of damaged self-image. One man said that his thoughts as a child followed the pattern: "I'm not an Indian. I don't want to be an Indian. Everyone looks down on you..." Another man said: "Growing up, I thought we were second-class citizens;" a belief that he could find endless justification for in the way that he and his family were treated. One elder, at 72 years old, had an audible crack in his voice while talking about his lifelong inability to fit in. School left him "neither white, nor Indian," and he hasn't yet found his full identity, an absence which still hurts.<br /><br />Luckily, the day ended on a high note, with a man defiantly shouting: "I'm proud to be an Indian, whether I'm wanted or not!" Applause and cheers followed.<br /><br /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5351826435870101090" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjiHbBNpvNGF9DKbiFVRNjfeIaJHn9sKQgAuV2nE3yrcnQYE5I5u1neKkhX_4WO-bvsCxwB-KGvKH9_D6-2MZ95GpDz3o3DPSYYgo0qxLaBkIfVjmC9-KNd2Ph9j6uCzB8vJvSVcNAzCGo/s320/DSC_0574.JPG" /><br />Fun Fact: while it was open, Thomas Indian School was almost universally called "<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_12" class="blsp-spelling-error">Saalem</span>." Now that it's closed, people are willing to admit that the nickname was made up by the children who attended it -- it's a shortened form of "Asylum," modified just enough in pronunciation so as to not be clearly recognizable. Although the word has two meanings, it was always intended to be a reference to a prison, not a sanctuary. That the school actually acted as a dark combination of those definitions is just one of life's ironies.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12256607085558454970noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8819126854900793189.post-39191141958794427942009-06-21T23:32:00.003-05:002009-06-26T20:57:55.440-05:00Divide and ConquerThe early schools, we've heard repeatedly, were frantic to avoid allowing students to band together or form connections with one another. This is understandable from two perspectives: if children are able to receive comfort from one another, they'll be harder to break; and if the older children act as one, the potential for violent rebellion is high.<br /><br />Some of the methods of dividing and conquering have been discussed before, some have not. It seems to have been such an important priority that I have decided to give it its own post here. The tactics fall under two broad categories.<br /><br />SEPARATION<br /><em>Keep the children amongst strangers, alone and frightened.</em> Among the stories we have heard:<br /><br />Dividing the children of a tribe up and sending them to different schools.<br /><br />Send children too far away from home to ever return to on foot.<br /><br />Put siblings in different dorms. Make sure they do not interact. Whip those who meet with each other.<br /><br />If close friendships form, transfer one or more students.<br /><br />DIVISION<br /><em>Make the children hate each other. Make the children hate Indians.</em> Among the stories we have heard:<br /><br />The Gauntlet (very common): when a student is punished, make the other students stand in a line and hit the "runner" as he moves down the row. The gauntlet is always run twice: the first time is the student being punished; the second time is the student whose hit was the weakest.<br />There is at least one confirmed case in which running the gauntlet proved to be fatal.<br /><br />Randomly selecting students to choose punishments for offenders. If the punishment is deemed too lax, the matron chooses a new punishment and both children receive it.<br /><br />Hiring Indian men to administer all physical discipline. This was the case at Mount Pleasant for some years. If a child was hurt, it was at the hands of another Indian.<br /><br />No punishments given if an older boy sodomizes a younger. This was surprisingly common; although I suppose one could expect that violated, powerless boys would eventually act out in this manner.<br /><br />Relaxed punishment for Indian-on-Indian violence.<br /><br /><br /><br />Marlin has said that his mother grew up afraid of other Indians; it's one of the long-lasting pains that motivates his work today.<br /><br />And these were children -- little kids facing adults who had detailed plans and tactics to destroy them. Go find an eight-year-old. Remind yourself how truly innocent and vulnerable they are. They didn't stand a chance.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12256607085558454970noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8819126854900793189.post-47475162991002079522009-06-21T23:31:00.022-05:002009-06-26T21:07:27.860-05:006/17 MOUNT PLEASANT [Michigan]Blogger is doing strange things with spacing and order, again. I'm fixing it whenever I catch it, but I don't have the time to use the fine-tooth comb I'd like. Have I mentioned yet that time is tight? It is.<br /><br />Mount Pleasant, Michigan.<br /><br />Oh, Mount Pleasant, Michigan.<br /><br />Even thinking about it makes me smile. Mount Pleasant was awesome. I left feeling loved and appreciated, and got to watch a community come together to call for wellness, which was powerful and motivating. I love you, Mount Pleasant.<br /><br />Haskell, Kansas: you can bite me.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiR_4sU469XPYo6A153uWBAl2RomWQgTVuYodr0hSrYGYSkFU1aX40a3T75D563dL5oD8rzmBvRkxmFSI1WhYREQC8WpTatbYT7n4xok-mIAq5IiQ9nn4XlA34QldRDLPVC-9DlRkc_H48/s1600-h/DSC_0463.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5351806134032950338" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiR_4sU469XPYo6A153uWBAl2RomWQgTVuYodr0hSrYGYSkFU1aX40a3T75D563dL5oD8rzmBvRkxmFSI1WhYREQC8WpTatbYT7n4xok-mIAq5IiQ9nn4XlA34QldRDLPVC-9DlRkc_H48/s320/DSC_0463.JPG" /></a> <p></p><br /><br /><br />The first thing that was clear about Mount Pleasant was that they were PREPARED. They planned for a thousand people; unlike other places that (ostensibly) "planned" to have a thousand people, Mount Pleasant did the WORK for a thousand people.<br /><br />Maybe it's some kind of Michigan work ethic. If I've learned anything from this trip, it's that every major road in the United States is permanently "under construction." "Under construction" means "we set up a bunch of cones." Michigan is -- and I mean this in a very literal way -- the absolute first state during this Journey in which I have seen actual workers behind the cones. One was even driving a machine of some kind. Everywhere else -- irregardless of the time, date, or location -- has been totally devoid of workers. Miles of cones, without a solitary soul leaning on a shovel.<br /><br />The second thing that was clear about Mount Pleasant is that they were dedicated. We had, at one point, thought we'd be in town around 4:00. We called ahead to say that it'd be later; more like 5:00. We actually arrived around 6:00. This is more or less standard practice; if you made "Indian Time" and "Precision" share an apartment, it'd make for a great sitcom. We weren't terribly concerned about this delay; usually, we meet a person or two in a residential or otherwise-relaxed environment. Upon arriving here, however, we learned that there were over 40 volunteers working on this event -- and they had ALL WAITED for us.<br /><br />Among their volunteers, they had an entire film team that was following the event with the expectation that the footage they received would be polished and sorted, then mailed directly to me. They... they thought of me. I love Mount Pleasant. I received a copy of the three-page report given to the people on the film crew: it explained, in meticulous detail, what shots would be best, which parts would be inappropriate to film, and information about timing, formatting, and responsibilities.<br /><br />They understood that we needed to be on the road, and scheduled our time so that we could do our piece and leave. This was not the end of their event, however. Even without us, they had two days of forgiveness-related events planned, including a live concert and guest speakers.<br /><br /><br />Try to imagine how we felt, waking up that morning. Our energy had been sapped over the last week or more; my enthusiasm had gotten tied up in days of driving, struggling with finding electricity, using outdoor tents with difficult lighting, poor sleep in borderline-illegal motels, and an endless march of small misadventures. Don covers it up well, but I can tell the low turnouts have been getting him down. The re-scheduling and hectic pace have worn everyone else to little nubs -- especially given all the work that have gone into presenting for so few people. There were a few stops that were on the right side of average, and Oneida was unquestionably a step in the right direction, but the work has tired us out. Suddenly, and more or less unexpectedly, we drive into a town that welcomes us with enthusiasm, filling our weary arms with well-organized information about all the work they did in preparation for our arrival. A small army has assembled, volunteering their time to make the most of our energy, assisting us in any way possible. Local leaders are lined up to speak. The turnout is expected to dwarf every other stop, and they've really grasped the idea that we can't magically fix things -- it requires extensive community work; Mount Pleasant is the only place so far that's got an entire second day of events planned without us.<br /><br />And we rose out of our respective beds, pulled back the curtains, and silently watched the downpour.<br /><br />Try to picture it; words cannot capture the feeling of watching our almost-amazing outdoor event get rained out.<br /><br /><br />The day had been supposed to start with a community march through town; a parade through town, stopping on the courthouse steps for words by the local government, and finishing a 5.5-mile path to reach the site of the old boarding school, where tents had been set up and electricity <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-error">pre</span>-wired... including two stations specifically for me. Now, the plan was to use a high-school gym.<br /><br />We <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-error">disappointedly</span> drove to the gym, and were surprised to see how unbelievably packed it was. Even so, people seemed in good spirits, and volunteers delivered drinks and snacks to the milling crowd. One of the coordinators took the microphone (already set-up) and addressed the crowd with a <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-error">striaghtforward</span> declaration: "We're going anyway!"<br /><br />The people looked at the coordinator. They looked at the window at the rain. They looked back at the coordinator. And they cheered. And... they... cheered. I felt my heart dislodge itself and relocate to my throat -- like falling or shock, but stemming from an overwhelming pride.<br /><br />Don, of course, headed out with the marchers almost immediately, against our recommendation. I really hope he doesn't get pneumonia. As for the rest of us, we decided to advance directly to the boarding school and make sure everything was ready-to-go. And by "to the boarding school," I guess I really meant "to a coffee shop to reduce the caffeine jitters." Something called "Tim Horton's" apparently outranks Starbucks, a feat I thought impossible with this crew. I didn't have any particularly compelling reason to follow the march, as they had their own cameras following along -- also they'd be destroyed in the rain.<br /><br /><br />Arriving at the tent, I was again impressed by the organization. Besides a big white tent in a field, they were busily setting up additional axillary tents around the perimeter of the bigger ones, taping the flaps together to make sure they didn't obstruct <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-error">anyone's</span> views. A three-man team had pulled a trailer up to the front, filled to the brim with mixers and other pieces of sound equipment. I asked if they were also recording the sound -- they said no. I said, "okay." By the time I had gone and found the masking tape I was looking for, they had called in to somewhere, and someone was en route with recording equipment; they took my address and said they could have it in the mail to me within two days. Wow.<br /><br />Looking around, I had a moment of disorientation: all the jobs I had slowly absorbed over the course of the Journey were already being done. Suddenly unsure what to do with myself, I tentatively started setting up a light -- mostly to look busy. Someone noticed this and approved: "Great idea! [beep-beep-<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_4" class="blsp-spelling-error">boop</span>-<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_5" class="blsp-spelling-error">boop</span>-<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_6" class="blsp-spelling-error">boop</span>] Yeah, hi, is Jim there? Jim! One of the Journey members had a great idea. Can we get some lights sent down to illuminate the stage? Uh-huh. Could you find a way to make it ten minutes, instead? Perfect!" I sat mutely in the grass with a bulb in hand.<br /><br />So impressive was their organization that it was a kind of perverse relief when the tent flaps started exploding. Previously taped up, they had (naturally) filled with rain water and began releasing water in violent bursts. This was a bad thing to happen, of course, but I think it plays a large part in my fond memories of the event. Without this mistake, I might have been <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_7" class="blsp-spelling-error">creeped</span> out by the <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_8" class="blsp-spelling-error">Stepfordian</span> exactitude; this proved that they were human.<br /><br />We finished well ahead of the marchers, so we granted ourselves a minute to wait and relax. The volunteers had prepared a <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_9" class="blsp-spelling-error">slideshow</span> of related community events, and some <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_10" class="blsp-spelling-error">Enyaesque</span> music was piped in to the tent. Through the <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_11" class="blsp-spelling-error">slideshow</span>, we also learned that the town council had declared August to be <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_12" class="blsp-spelling-error">Wellbriety</span> month in Mount Pleasant. The <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_13" class="blsp-spelling-error">slideshow</span> appeared remarkably well for an outdoor projection; when I asked about it they showed me the $8,000 projector they'd rented. I'm pretty sure the projector we've been using came in a cereal box. The large screen they used for visuals cost another $1,000, bringing the total cost for equipment for showing Don's presentation to just under five digits.<br /><br />There were only two small problems that occurred: one was due to their hyper-sensitivity to guaranteeing that the marchers had an unobstructed path to the center of the tent, which led to lots of unnecessary shuffling of chair positions. The other was their ban on smoking while on site, which was mentioned periodically and still had to be brought up on a person-by-person basis all day.<br /><br /><br />This brings to mind two constants I've seen throughout. During the open mic segment, speakers will almost always introduce themselves by saying the number of days or years that they've been sober. It's well-known the extent to which alcohol abuse has infiltrated Indian communities, but the backlash against it shows incredible force: there's a lot of committed AA-members. This sobriety-introduction underlines both the personal importance of AA (where I imagine most people got their practice speaking publicly, which is part of why it appears now) and also the bonds of shared experience that nearly everyone we meet seems to have. The second constant is smoking. Smoking is very, very common, more so than I expected to ever see in America. For a lot of people, I think it's probably a lesser vice that they can use as a crutch to avoid alcohol. But there's also the social importance of the sacred plant, tobacco; I'm not sure exactly what impact that has on Native smoking.<br /><br />The religious importance of tobacco has bothered me for some time. I'm willing to be aware and respectful of the beliefs of the communities we visit, even if they're not my own; even so, I have a hard time seeing tobacco as anything but an evil plant. In my mental web, it's tied to addiction, poison, cancer, slavery, and the collapse of the American Deep South. Positives are non-existent. Yet, it's considered holy by so many... I wish I could have some grasp of how and why.<br />By 11:00, the rain had almost completely lifted and there was still no sign of the walkers. I allowed myself to get roped into the pathological chair moving, discovering that I can lift exactly four chairs comfortably. It's been a journey of personal discovery, too. The change in weather is welcome: we can't guarantee that there will be room under the tents -- it depends on how many people actually arrive for the tent part of the day.<br /><br /><br />I notice a sign up (something about not littering, I think it was) which ends with "<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_14" class="blsp-spelling-error">Meegwech</span>," meaning "thank you." I've seen that word at home, too, but it's always been spelled either "<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_15" class="blsp-spelling-error">Miigwetch</span>" or "<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_16" class="blsp-spelling-error">Miigwech</span>." I wonder how much the language is different between Minnesota and Michigan, versus how different the settlers were who used phonetic Anglicization to write foreign words.<br /><br />At about noon, a few people finally emerged from the trees, carrying a banner and marching proudly. Those who had driven directly to the tent cheered and clapped, and we began turning on the switches and warming up the lights. The new arrivals were of different ages, and more than a little damp, but we were glad to see them.<br /><br />Then the trees started to get pushed back while marchers began spilling into the clearing by the tent. And they came, and came, and came. Not even Macbeth himself could have been so surprised by the endless armies a forest could shake loose.<br /><br /><br /><p><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5351800646454765298" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhvE912J4c-W5cEWLgdWkC7K4bA8Gwuki1xF1iFhk6C5EKumeKUloDxjk2CcH0c_TK3t4IhIkyQSYkh9K6LUUQ0sq7cTFtBbMgz_Qlug7x2L0V38gFB4xkMqRs-C1azYtglhTzij2yIbYM/s320/DSC_0322.JPG" /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5351800654427040882" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMZlfgkpoEpuOxeQ1HfjZzbPH4Xgci3kQkIBgeZxRZPcURbJ_PyqN9lKZny-o_PxwmU4CY9VGUi5W0xs4RIBfCXsDxRYefZGZu5vrE6Rb87p8r-hQ0RQMhu3lEj39zfSU1UdJ1LaIUckI/s320/DSC_0323.JPG" /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5351800660973494018" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrn7H4YrD9YZRBCPdVru1TjsnH6ruL2HtV3m0RsW53tgJghtRby49huM1hdtAGbIH77N9LHm-h6GVt2ByC81TYHLEoBRWoz8TMqGLfSD58McWIV7vr_c-a1HJ45SNx2hMuqx2afq-S0so/s320/DSC_0326.JPG" /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5351800669469001826" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgh1d4M4BXM6V3Hn7Fh87epgCquQbkkPa-ULYG7F2-AmNzjYBOWFK3tabIwff3DOPtbjnSWX2CyknVa_Z-zxARd8bsMQ6GNfv5EC4lQZnIV7KFJecERg81uU7zQMutvWf7n0bY2FFrboZY/s320/DSC_0341.JPG" /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5351800672894362674" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtcJjifxAbWmI8ChGikf-Cj0JcCaj8jZcvGbYcD_x4fJGo9g4AHRAl_LKvvso0A_7r72X6fcHxc68u7Iecd6R6MzztVzlZ5YGKjzBoq-sD3CIySHiVSKIK2pkgR8eEtL_iiSTPOtUoSwM/s320/DSC_0345.JPG" /><br /><br />By the time the hundreds had finally gathered, it was decided it would be wise to delay the beginning of the presentation and start right in with lunch. The decision was met with support. While the hot dogs and burgers were distributed, Marlin and I were invited to take a private tour of the boarding school. On the way there, I overheard someone saying, "I never thought I'd hear our politicians say those things in my lifetime." Whatever happened at the courthouse must have been something good.<br /><br />The school is composed of perhaps a dozen separate buildings organized within a rectangle covering maybe two square blocks. The gym has been maintained, and is used to this day. The others have been condemned, and entrance is blocked by law without special dispensation. We chose the chapel to visit, and it clearly had seen better days; or, depending on how you look at it, much worse days. Everything was crumbling and generally pretty unsafe. A white powder covered the floor, it's possible it was asbestos. The presence of asbestos in some of the buildings contributed to their current deserted state. Just to be safe, I refrained from licking the floor.<br /><br />While a groundskeeper answered a few of Marlin's questions, I wandered off and found myself descending a staircase into darkness. How, exactly, I "find" myself doing things like this is a question of greater complexity than a mere blog could cover. What I found, deep underground, was a stone-and-mortar passage, wide enough for three to stand abreast, with a series of little slits along the ceiling, now pasted over.<br /><br />Hurrying back upstairs to the relative comfort of the ruined chapel, I caught the tail end of the <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_17" class="blsp-spelling-error">groundskeeper's</span> lesson. Marlin had asked to see the boys' dorm, and he had refused. In his decades of service, he'd made himself a promise never to go in that building again if he could help it. Something was "wrong," and he wanted no part of it. We left by the side door to at least see the outside of the dorm. The chapel stood on one "lot," next to a grassy lot; on the other side of which was the dorm. Sidewalks ran between each lot. No one left the sidewalk; no one crossed the grassy lot for a closer look.<br /><br /><br /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5351804450401895618" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiulrnXzLMp7fdLjvyQzi4jxxcnSwW5vdC2mqNLQC4rH8FUPkeSQittOfn2suaXPe233asOfHq_yGxzBKF2peLpxZNjxpg5iju0_mZLau0hgKNhtcNU7XW40trozsbKHrtIH2LxzGgUw-M/s320/DSC_0410.JPG" /> The dorm has a weighty institutionally <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_18" class="blsp-spelling-error">gothic</span> look. It has two stories, with four windows on each story. It is, simply put, <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_19" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">repulsive</span>; not in the sense of "disgusting," but in the original sense: it pushes you back when you try to approach. Every Halloween, the town police catch teens who have broken onto the grounds; the standard dare is to touch the dorm. A very few will go inside; they are almost invariably vandals. It makes sense; the only logical response to a building like that is to try to destroy it.<br /><br />I don't consider myself to be a <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_20" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">superstitious</span> person; I'm not going to argue for the existence of ghosts or magic or unicorns. What I know is what I experience: the boys' dorm at the Mount Pleasant boarding school in Michigan is bad news. Take it as you will.<br /><br />As an interesting side note, a human-rights worker was also touring the chapel. He and I both found a single window in the dorm <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_21" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">particularly</span> absorbing: the second one from the left on the top. I kept feeling like someone was going to look out of it. Odd.<br /><br /><br /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5351804436712468882" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwNRKBCBAw32vylv2dDrgUeMfmYtT-h3MncpAmBdIn3oHOOb8L8eJbyhRexcXed7v3qtyi2ZE7JMHGguuC5Ql_0k0li4CwTp-vuhxMnI7I-VCT6S5OJYW1NziKwSHc2zr5noCSQYytYsM/s320/DSC_0380.JPG" /> And, really, my point in all this is just that it's odd. It's a strange, uncomfortable place; but that shouldn't distract from the things that really happened there, and the real efforts people are making to heal.<br /><br />Our guide was very motivated to show us the gym, because it was nicely fixed up. The gym was nice. It doesn't make much of a story, though.<br /><br /><br />The open mic stories revealed that there really was no end to the creativity employed by the boarding schools. Cut loose from any system of oversight or punishment, these people went straight to Lord of the Flies. It's really the most chilling aspect of any of this: William Golding was right. Evil lurks just below the skin of average people.<br /><br />Smudging is a religious rite in which smoke is allowed to flow over <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_22" class="blsp-spelling-error">someone's</span> body as a form of purification. One woman put on a smudging ceremony when she was a student; the nuns submerged her in scalding water as punishment.<br /><br />A middle-aged guy, big and physically strong, talked about his time in school. He switched in and out of first and third person, depending on how difficult the story was. "And if... a little boy... dribbles on... the seat..." As a child, his punishment for "dribbling" was to be taken aside by a priest and kicked in the crotch.<br /><br />One elder tried to go inside during a cold winter day's recess. He was beaten and forced back outside, banned from going inside. When finally allowed in, he couldn't move his hands. The frostbite is still visible today. His personal mantra was, "I am <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_23" class="blsp-spelling-error">Anishinabe</span>. I will not cry."<br /><br />That elder told his entire story twice: the first time entirely in his native tongue. It's strange this hasn't happened more often.<br /><br /><br />But, on the whole, the tone of the event was different than any we're had yet. It was genuinely positive: focusing more on the modern-day spirit of life and survival. The details about boarding school experiences were generally skimmed over, alluded to but not centered on. The more important fact was that people made it through, and that the town was ready to come together and heal today. When people had been positive in other towns, there had always been a note of denial or cover-up; this was a total change of perception: Awful things happened, but we're moving forward now and that's wonderful. This is what healthiness looks like.<br /><br />In the end, there was a large healing ceremony with Jingle Dress dancers and hundreds of people praying at the Hoop. Frustratingly, Marlin forbade any pictures or recording, so that particular moment will never be seen again. Maybe that's appropriate, in its way, but it was still frustrating for me. It would have been a great picture. Actually, a lot of the event was frustrating for me in that way. Something about the condemened buildings encroaching on the tent, the crowds of people in all directions, the wet grass, the smell of Michigan after a rain... it was a hard event to capture. The scope and feel of the day was just too much to get on film. That saddens me, a little.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFt1XbHI066pxWTCLlILLSaDyFiCZ_WAAj0JUPZTXnyQAQtZKymVT_hoieI-4sxv-knFS-xmYWGB-tK9RYq7iAujQ0knxnKpl-IphReCavT9tqCm2BkOrRkQfYn1l9kgmz4XjwRdvw8Ts/s1600-h/DSC_0397.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5351804441016045506" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFt1XbHI066pxWTCLlILLSaDyFiCZ_WAAj0JUPZTXnyQAQtZKymVT_hoieI-4sxv-knFS-xmYWGB-tK9RYq7iAujQ0knxnKpl-IphReCavT9tqCm2BkOrRkQfYn1l9kgmz4XjwRdvw8Ts/s320/DSC_0397.JPG" /></a><br /><br />I have a few last notes jotted down that I don't feel like working in chronologically or thematically. Here they are:<br /><br />Good quote: "A Christian school with barbed-wire fences."<br /><br />The petition gained 565 new signatures today.<br /><br />I got in the way a lot today, for whatever reason. I almost backed into the Hoop, once, and the Jingle Dress dancers had to step over a light. Oops.<br /><br />People put offerings on the rim on the Hoop, just like every other stop except Oneida. In Oneida, they dropped offerings (tobacco) in the center of the Hoop. I guess it was a very localized culture-difference.<br /><br />Since the screen was rear-projected, repeated problems with people trying to hide behind it and take pictures of Don speaking. Every time, it made them huge instead of invisible. </p><p><br /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5351806129731357938" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8jMFG7GtimvGXDRRKFlMfjvcFHEcheWxeoGa1StxHt8paNRHZoPG6AKHCEoOY0M00XxFJ3gcwKcILBmMoOYm_lF1C26MgPT-OR_4Wxa1yKhFo4dNlo_ZPeXuSi9fAMQ6-ldfSVLySIaY/s320/DSC_0449.JPG" /><br />The MC was named Joe, and his enthusiasm made me smile several times. His style was somewhere between lounge singer, carnival barker, and television gameshow host. He also was unable to complete a thought without saying "...going to go ahead and...", "in a Good Way," or "at this time." He seemed like a good guy.<br /><br />One lady asked about broadcasting the movies we were giving away, including Mino Mikana. She's part of a small, local channel. It's fun to think of my work being on television.<br /><br />When I was out wandering among the buildings, I stopped by a little nook between two buildings. That place, more than any other, felt awful. I was very, very uncomfortable there. I took a picture, not knowing what else to do. Later, I showed it to the group: both Maria and Marlin recognized it immediately, and said they had hated that spot, too. Very strange. </p><p><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 213px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 320px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5351806122509886994" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhecXVAczn7SOYjzHTV__Dzx_jbQJgzd3VNHenOas5K0D66YIpV9CXU_KWQYii_YR6dm89au6tWftn78t0l2V3_W1JIykZUA-_iHp9I9hxeV_p-FouSk4Gonky8jSHQqD9k3SEVSJ38u3o/s320/DSC_0423b.jpg" /></p>Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12256607085558454970noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8819126854900793189.post-49227152047807737692009-06-21T23:31:00.014-05:002009-06-24T22:55:53.958-05:006/15 ONEIDA [Wisconsin]Personally, today was something of an odd day. I slept well (hooray!) and was generally feeling well, but I seemed to be unable to connect with the team. I felt unintentionally distant; still no <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">theories</span> as to why this would be.<br /><br />I had groaned a little when I learned that this would be another outdoor event; but everything was well-organized and ready to go. The tent was good-sized, but still let in light and air; it wasn't set on asphalt; electricity was <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-error">pre</span>-wired; and things just generally were put together well. Points for Oneida.<br /><br /><br />The opening welcome / prayer gave insight into the way this particular culture was structured; specifically, it was <em>very</em> structured. In the local tradition, everything is divided up into <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">hierarchies</span>, and each subgroup has a clear leader. For example, thanks were given to the trees, but particularly to the maples, as they were the <em>best</em> trees. Thanks were given to the plants, but mostly to the <em>best</em> plant: tobacco. The same was done for birds (eagles), animals (don't remember), fruits (strawberries), and a few other categories. I suppose every culture does something like this, but usually it's not so overt; I'm more used to unspoken understandings.<br /><br />***Cigars are good, but Cubans are best. Music players are good, but <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-error">iPods</span> are best. Tomatoes are good, but Organic ones are best. Fishing is good, but Fly Fishing is best. Etc.*** Most people don't say these out loud, but they're more-or-less understood. In Oneida, it was in-your-face rankings.<br /><br /><br />Set-up was a difficult due to the large screen brought in for the <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_4" class="blsp-spelling-error">powerpoint</span> projection. It took several people some time to assemble, during which time I waited to see what space it took up before placing my own equipment. Don used this time to listen to his presentation on his computer's external speakers; this later created great difficulty when I hooked his computer up to the sound system. Because his external speakers were still on, no signal was sent to the speakers; nearly a half-hour was wasted trying to figure out what was going wrong, which wires needed replacing, etc. Don seemed pretty frustrated when the answer was finally discovered, and I couldn't help but feel abashed.<br /><br />It was a moot point, anyways: the sun was too bright to project anything at all and the <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_5" class="blsp-spelling-error">powerpoint</span> was scrapped at the last minute.<br /><br /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5350639549626855234" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgsEizRMro4e-cqe3evOBx-EZGF5gY4KKWFejH-wD9OQ02t7DpRRtaxKnIHJncTxWG12mCCjPQ4vdGEzOzud0HtCcXoRmKLlXJO-DOldhVMLPGLvP4xECGU5ECVmPXGuPXzyLhE6RqB6hM/s320/DSC_0267.JPG" /><br />Tools of the trade: Sage, Incense, Microphones, Kleenex.<br /><br /><br />The day started off with a lengthy introduction that was actually pretty touching. Everyone from the tribe lined up on one side of the tent, every visitor lined up on the other. In turn, every single tribal member formally welcomed every individual visitor and invited them into their community. It took a long time, but left everyone feeling good; and certainly made the visitors feel appreciated. Then, the White Bison people were introduced to the crowd. This included myself, and marked only the second time I'd been noticed while on the Journey. The other was in <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_6" class="blsp-spelling-error">Flandreau</span>, where I was given a ceremonial braid of <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_7" class="blsp-spelling-error">sweetgrass</span>. I haven't quite figured out what to do with that, yet. It was sort of nice to be appreciated; however, I've also gotten pretty used to hiding in the shadows.<br /><br />Marlin, for whatever reason, was introduced as a Vikings' fan. One grandmother towards the back of the tent could be heard to yell, "Which one is he?" Oh, Wisconsin.<br /><br /><br />As mentioned, Don gave up on his slide show. I think this was the only time it wasn't used. He also showed an adeptness for changing his presentation on-the-fly; he used the information from the opening prayer and managed to incorporate more eagles, maples, and strawberries than you'd think possible.<br /><br /><br />The Panel was generally pretty good, which is always a big plus. The first speaker was a <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_8" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">dietitian</span>, who talked a little about eating right; they neglected to make this relevant or interesting. I can't even remember now if it was a man or a woman talking; zoning out was the best defense. The audience apparently agreed; it's always awkward when someone finishes talking and sits down without any applause from the crowd.<br /><br />That person was followed by a statesman and activist, who was awesome. One of his<br />themes was the necessity of "wearing different hats" in modern society, which was backed up by a variety of literal hats that he traded out periodically. Props = Preparedness, and it was appreciated. He had a good story about showing up to be sworn in after his election, and wearing full traditional regalia in a room full of men with dark suits and ties. When someone whispered to him, "What are you doing?", he replied with, "I woke up this morning and remembered I was <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_9" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">Menominee</span>!" I liked him, and wish I'd remembered to write down his name. <a href="http://www.whitebison.org/">http://www.whitebison.org/</a> probably has it.<br /><br /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5350639540612186034" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwMkd9dgfDqTNEFrJUeKJ9IHcbS6GqRpS8kw0T8exnoQAR7v5q4OjVujj_O9X6VKLxn41oAFYMBEZ5AqokjuTwwC7N9-rsf4P5xbRjwzOt4FlearTtaWMD_hyphenhyphenj_Lvq108Wxv_bUs20KVc/s320/DSC_0198.JPG" /><br /><br />The last speaker was maybe my favorite so far. Her name, if I recall correctly, was Loretta; she serves as the local historian and record-keeper. She combined those two excellent traits which so rarely go together: historical fact and ability to stay on subject. I probably could have listened to her remember things all day, and they really applied, too!<br /><br /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5350639546893723170" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3GBm3Jrut0tEMFW1ZdaUsWXkgvBg7ai48O9aYsGP4Gu0CASugf-KXgN3uhPce_cUebb1UfrrwcNvLkPWotkdqeZ-dxMm5f3-0arC_UkJ0rJtYUwoUFb2zcL3nuzHtFinsBBRMwl6h9hU/s320/DSC_0208.JPG" /><br /><br />She was also, to put it perhaps-too-casually, "spunky as all get-out." The first words out of her mouth, when she took the microphone, were: "I'm a really <em>old</em> person." This was followed by, "I've never had any signs of <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_10" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">Alzheimer's</span>, but stop me if you see any." She identified herself as the historian ("I'm supposed to be in my office right now"), but <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_11" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">admitted</span> that out-of-<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_12" class="blsp-spelling-error">towners</span> might be more likely to recognize her from lunch: "You may have seen the two young ladies taking my blouse on the hill." You just KNOW there's a story, there.<br /><br />She would have been perfect except for an unfortunate tendency to wander back and forth while speaking. This messes with my camera's ability to focus in the shaded tent, and I broke a sweat trying to get the darn thing to center on her before she said something else priceless. "My time is up? No? That's good!"<br /><br />She had some of Pratt's original speeches printed up. They were chilling stuff, especially insofar as he was recognized as a humanitarian at the time. He was lauded for his new views on Indians, such as "It is ONLY the Indian in them that aught to be killed." He also coined the term, "Kill the Indian, Save the Man."<br /><br />I wasn't able to find his speeches online, although they should be available somewhere. Here's a mention in the 1900 New York Times, however, where he defends slavery:<br /><br /><a href="http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?_r=1&res=9D06E4D7153DE433A25753C2A9649D946197D6CF">http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?_r=1&res=9D06E4D7153DE433A25753C2A9649D946197D6CF</a><br /><br />And here's his glowing epitaph. It makes me a little <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_13" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">nauseous</span>. Of particular note is the implied praise for the "unique outing system." I don't remember if I've written about the outing system, but it involved sending students to live with white families during the summer months -- ostensibly to learn a trade or to see life in a civilized home. This was meant to keep children from reconnecting with their parents or families, leaving them with no <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_14" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">permanent</span> sense of "home." This made them less likely to run away and more docile, which was the whole point. On paper, children were to receive a small daily wage while on the outing system, teaching them about the value of working for money. In practice, the daily wage (provided by the government) was given directly to the white families hosting the student as compensation for lodging. And, since there was no enforcement of any standards of living whatsoever, the outing system was a <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_15" class="blsp-spelling-error">de</span> facto slaving operation in which Indian children were sent to do any work asked of them for long hours with no pay. This was merely a side-benefit, however; the real goal, as always, was to make children that were isolated, timid, and silently fearful. Outing provided a way to keep the kids from receiving any kind of love or support from their families during the short summer breaks.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.arlingtoncemetery.net/rhpratt.htm">http://www.arlingtoncemetery.net/rhpratt.htm</a><br /><br /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5350640355000070082" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgur2NUYxdEgyxXSKF4PukgMAIkTQ_AdN2iZBbGo4jeE_24AwSY8RgMDS2XM1uuEUYuFo-5uYPQcyGRQFwN2mczQL7B9apDeRUk2gJkL8NedQCbbdooR4coNz-6N9leNqZ4CPSwpA1Kb4w/s320/DSC_0134.JPG" /><br /><br />Two stories came up again and again in Oneida: kneeling on broomsticks and never being touched. These were big-ticket issues in Oneida; apparently, some horrible administrator was fond of the broomstick punishment. If you don't think that sounds awful, try it for sixty seconds, then remember that these kids were on sticks for <em>hours.</em><br /><br />The community was also very concerned about the lack of touch experienced; and many were very candid about how difficult it was for them to touch their own children. This led to a deep-rooted shame -- Oneida gets the same parenting magazines everywhere else gets, and everyone knows that babies should be held and such. People from the last two generations got up and talked about being unable to touch their children, despite knowing it would be for the best; the sense of passing on this social disability clearly haunted these people with immense (self-aware) guilt. One grandmother admitted to never hugging her children; unexpectedly, she abruptly broke down and apologized through her tears: "I'm so sorry. I did my best. I'm sorry." She, of course, had grown up in a boarding school herself; the lessons she learned kept her from being the parent she felt she aught to have been.<br /><br /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5350639562862306274" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjr4vtqQcmgzwfMecBrDqAIG2Hdrhcb5NEG76XR36yNoVVBW2hwy2cHyZ6zVJxTkEaYaQY5GLGo8W0PMRf951CHxwJEkpiH4WDeB2jcLr6wjblS92XwVlskz8rcDGTTI58xcU93s3BPxpA/s320/DSC_0145.JPG" /><br />The opening procession brings in the Staff, the Hoop, and Brandi Jo.<br /><br /><br />The next few paragraphs (or lines, depending on what I end up writing) will be about quotes heard during the day, mostly during the open mic section.<br /><br /><br />A sense of cultural inferiority was drummed into children from day one, combined with a crippling sense of powerlessness. This self-hatred manifested itself, for some parents, in a dream that their children would find ways to leave Indian society altogether. One woman's advice from her mother was: "Don't marry an Indian. You'll just get in trouble. Marry a white man." "So I did," she finished.<br /><br />Another woman talked about her life before learning about her native roots. "I was a modern housewife. I didn't care if I polluted." She found herself more in-tune with the Earth after beginning to attend a longhouse. What I found particularly interesting about this is that Oneida is the FIRST place on the Journey so far that has offered recycling bins during lunch. I saved all my cans and bottles in my van for the first week-and-a-half before giving up and tossing them. I would have expected recycling to be the most basic thing to see, given the importance of nature in traditional cultural beliefs. Even the people on the Journey have been known to leave a cigarette butt behind now and again; not that you heard it here. I suspect there may be some more work tying together beliefs and practice; still, Oneida is on the right track.<br /><br />"So much I want to say, and so much that I can't -- the secrets." They say you're only as sick as your secrets; the burden of living with secrets can poison a life. What if it's a whole culture with secrets? We're looking at the secrets Indian communities are holding... but they're not the only ones.<br /><br />What secrets does America need to confess for our national healing?<br /><br />"If the Creator gives you a little, tiny body, you LOVE that tiny body! If the Creator gives you a... <em>fluffy...</em> body, you LOVE it and you work the HECK out of it!" Good for her.<br /><br />One guy remembered learning his native language from his father when he was a child, but never from his mother, who always withdrew coldly. Finally, it erupted in a big fight behind closed doors; he overheard the end of the fight through the door: "Don't you remember what they did to you?" The fight ended, it was never discussed or mentioned again, and he never <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_16" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">received</span> another lesson from his father. His parents died years later; nothing was ever said about it or the meaning of "what they did" explained.<br /><br />One man remembered being taken aside as an eight-year-old and told bluntly: "We can't keep you no more, or they'll put us in jail." He was taken away; his first day at school he was beaten with a rubber hose.<br /><br /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5350639553566564226" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkPKc69Cn8m_JAXXpTrWgdNPbghXOP1t8Ksak7IS-zJOFGKkXtBk714KS1c4svWCJPsDxnTk8IDdVlTLMigleA8z0jtOXvKd9ZbavR2FJ4I9-8EqleagKRfiqvvomoi31MKb_rNC4_EKs/s320/DSC_0157.JPG" /><br />Caption: the Hoop is brought in.<br /><br />One person talked about the mixing of traditional and Christian values, not realizing as a child that creating an "honor plate" for the deceased at funerals wasn't a standard Episcopalian practice. I've heard people saying that the mixing of beliefs (like that) isn't appropriate. I'd only see a problem if the fundamental values conflict -- and that really doesn't happen very often. The honor plate is kind of a nice idea, really.<br /><br />One guy walked up to speak during the open mic, then was suddenly stuck down by grief before reaching the podium. He lurched to the side, and grabbed onto the Hoop for moral support. I, like a lot of people, was struck by sudden fear that this big, strong man was going to simply crush it in his grasp. Luckily, he didn't destroy it, and simply held onto it for several minutes before finding his voice and finishing the walk to the mic. He wasn't fully prepared to say what he needed to say, however, so he 'cooled off' by talking about history and giving himself a lengthy formal introduction. It's been interesting watching the ways that people <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_17" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">steel</span> and try to control themselves.<br /><br />One way that people often try to shield themselves is to suddenly switch to second or (sometimes) third person. For example, "I walked down the hall and saw a dog, and when you see a dog like that you just freeze in fear." This is not, of course, an actual quote.<br /><br />Anyways, while he was clinging to the Hoop for support, life went on around him. Most amusingly, a tiny little boy wandered past him, calling loudly for his mother.<br /><br />One man remembered how difficult it was to be stripped of his language. After acclimating, however, he was put in charge of teaching Latin to new students so they could fit in during church services. He's now maybe 60, and talked about how he still feels guilt to this day over becoming the "imposer." He became a tool of a system he hated, and it has haunted him his entire life. <p></p><p>Another guy talked about a local legend featuring a black-and-white monster that lived in the forests and stole children. This legend stretches back hundreds of years; and seemed to come to a darkly ironic fruition when the nuns built a school and began gathering unwilling students.<br /><br /><br />A strange thing happened during the lunch break. Some workers needed to move wires around, and they moved Brandi Jo to the side. I've been dimly aware of the little <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_18" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">silhouette</span> we carry around, but suddenly she commanded my full attention -- I felt oddly and fiercely protective of the little piece of wood these strangers were moving. Don says she has a spirit; all I knew is that if they hurt that cut-out, they'd have to deal with me personally. Honestly, my reaction frightened me a little.<br /><br /><br />There's been a couple of <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_19" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">occasions</span> where I've been struck by how disproportionate some people's <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_20" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">sadness</span> and reluctance seems. Seeing someone struggle in front of the microphone could indicate a great truth or a heartbreaking revelation -- or it could lead into a story that seems like nothing at all. No doubt something is lost in the translation, of course; also, my ability to accurately understand people's personal trauma may have been thrown out of calibration by weeks of steady horror.</p><p>I think there's a few lessons in this. First, every person -- every single person -- lives exactly one life: their own. Beyond a certain point, comparisons are pointless (or, more accurately, impossible). If you experience something, you choose its ultimate emotional value. When you start thinking about every person on Earth doing this simultaneously and constantly<em>... then you find yourself with a sentence I don't know how to end...</em> then it's a thought that is, you know, <em>big</em>. Man, that thought got away from me. Let's put it into an example: if I break my leg, it's painful and makes me very sad. If someone makes a (futile) effort to compare my pain against the room full of Vietnam-era Purple Heart veterans, I'm going to look pretty puny. But that doesn't make my pain any less real or any less difficult for me; and in the same stroke, the person who was doing the comparison lost the chance to understand me.</p><p>Secondly, people are fragile. A few people bring up what appear to be minor events -- minor events which have shaded their entire lives and are spoken of today only with great difficulty. As humans, we need to be gentle with each other: you never know what might impact someone for decades to come.</p><p>Finally, it doesn't always matter what your story is. Just the act of opening up can be terribly difficult. I've been listening to an <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_21" class="blsp-spelling-error">audiobook</span> of Dune in the car, and an early chapter talks about a religious order's efforts to separate humans from human animals. One clue is that true humans are often lonely. That thought has stuck with me for the last week or so. We can be awfully lonely creatures, and this struggle we have with being honest and open probably plays a big part.</p><br /><br />This post is getting awfully long, so I'm going to skip over a few of the musings in my notes and end with my surprise at learning people's ages. Many people look prematurely old, and the generational gap seems to be much smaller than I'm used to. In order to make the ages of families match up, there must be an awful lot of teenagers having babies. I wonder what the actual numbers are... and I wonder how much is just a matter of my expectations being off. It's a little jarring to hear not-terribly-old people talk about their great-grandchildren.<br /><br />edit: I forgot one of the most amazing parts of the day! <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_22" class="blsp-spelling-error">Mea</span> <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_23" class="blsp-spelling-error">culpa</span>. Some places, realizing that this kind of discussion can open up painful feelings that can't be easily controlled, have provided their own counselors and therapists. If you're finding yourself in a bad place, they're available for you to talk to. Oneida did that as well, but they also went one step further: during the lunch hour, they brought in a trailer full of horses. They were supposed to be trained to be particularly empathetic (or at least calm), and were available for you to speak to in private if you had something to say that you didn't yet want other people to hear. They were also available for brief rides. I didn't avail myself of this opportunity, as horses scare me, but I recognize a great idea when I hear one. More points for Oneida for this creative and thoughtful idea!Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12256607085558454970noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8819126854900793189.post-4626809444692270022009-06-21T23:30:00.007-05:002009-06-23T16:21:45.908-05:006/14 LAC DU FLAMBEAU [Wisconsin]Dredging up what French I recall, I'm pretty sure "Lac <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-error">du</span> <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-error">Flambeau</span>" translates as "Torch Lake," which brings to mind the <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-error">Cuyahoga</span> more than anything else. The big casino there bills itself as "Lake of the Torches Casino (and Resort)," which I'm pretty sure would be "Lac DES <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-error">Flambeau</span>," or possibly "Lac DES <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_4" class="blsp-spelling-error">FlambeauX</span>."<br /><br />Now that I feel appropriately smug, on with the post.<br /><div><br /></div><div><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5350580290998585746" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrPcSwS2nd-gP1fWkaBD70O39B9GA2yRnF-qpDYL9u7w7GajH7h9NT_s9lG1gQepcbI-NK-TC7D_2LZUbMX2Av61-P4schn17EyOO-dvAlbJOi0K6P0cNsRLKky0vl1QN404CHQxMi5h4/s320/DSC_0098.JPG" /></div><div><br /></div><div>It was with some chagrin that I realized Lac o' <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_5" class="blsp-spelling-error">Flambeau</span> would be one of the stops falling into the molds of Walker, <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_6" class="blsp-spelling-error">Anadarko</span>, and Rapid City. Like Walker, the setting was a white tent set up on pavement with cars all around. Like <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_7" class="blsp-spelling-error">Anadarko</span>, no one seemed to know if electricity was available. And, like Rapid City, organization felt loose to the point of losing control.</div><div><br /></div><div>Luckily, organization ultimately turned out to be fine, or at least fine-enough. Electricity did arrive, too, although it took a while. The ruins of the school (oddly) had electricity, but there were no extension cords long enough. So, someone drove out to find extension cords. We started in the meantime. When extension cords arrived, it was discovered that the front door was locked, so someone drove to go find a key. Then, some time later, someone drove to go find the person looking for the key, as they had run out of gas and were stalled out by the side of the road. By about lunchtime, I was finally powered and could get speakers running, etc.</div><div><br /></div><div>Turnout was low, perhaps due to some combination of the fact that we were just a little tent sitting literally in the middle of the road next to some ruins, and the fact that a few blocks away was the town's biggest and most important pow-wow of the year. Getting supplies was difficult. For example, we had to twist some arms to get <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_8" class="blsp-spelling-error">ahold</span> of flags and veterans to carry them. During the opening song, the <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_9" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">veterans</span> marched the flags into the tent, then out of the tent, then into their vans. They drove off to the pow-wow and never came back.</div><div></div><div><br /></div><div><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5350578873988093554" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjSWGhX0RulFHeQcUR_Q-_QYkd_TCAPV8GVJAyHa56NDCtfibfQp0INrLhNtDLFY8EZtcKBEcXxux-xwkmtOm3g0vC3cXQARl-t0Vc1RVtc0xElGcsfDHyJwiIu2py5C-WvOGtOCSa9sA0/s320/DSC_0037.JPG" /></div><div><br /></div><div>Getting a drum to play for us was difficult, too; we ended up getting the local youth drum. They were actually pretty good, despite their tender age.</div><div><br /></div><div><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5350578872821215170" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOREHuZstixzAFIgqMTZlRlQVfYkOsrldONEuFUyWMrUh9KXM5JVUagcD5h_ICCLJSAgou5JoT9YtKLE2P_Unkso5giFp2YdNp2LDwlboroaBClNQdV2XefChtquVjX-4ubJStGXyoFSU/s320/DSC_0027.JPG" /></div><div><br /></div><div><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5350578865489493298" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPcwEcYvMTdWt12NQqVtSfdr24lF8YDk7IBoApBl-RZ1Z8n0eOpN3lPgxlQ84yIyIBZOYfLXynWEZ4Zw6rizFcmicMsEPgJLdkMVnAjCnUei15UW702iBeGYIxJs8tWDjy3qPzBQaogtI/s320/DSC_0019.JPG" /></div><div><br /></div><div></div><div>I don't remember if the school itself stood behind us, or just one of the dorms. At any rate, it is a badly collapsing building that locals hope to <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_10" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">renovate</span> for the purpose of making a memorial / museum. To the untrained eye, it would appear that complete reconstruction would be necessary -- especially for the outside of the building, which someone <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_11" class="blsp-spelling-error">molotov'd</span> a few years back. The building is very unpopular in town, and it sounded like there was a lot of resentment still present in the community. The attempt to destroy it wasn't terribly surprising. What is surprising is that it didn't succeed -- the place looked timber-dry.<br /></div><div></div><br /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 213px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 320px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5350578882427050610" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9Qxx_t70e3i5fkjeaLP0Ncrm9caa9hQkcCdY-HuV9mlgGMb_cVmozvZfDp_ZYgBP5PpcNDjOtHAHBSlxw1e6cD6Xg3Nemr6F2GEWp6snQhCTEo4lsAcsB_19PgHWRtvRWQaWYoiKgUJI/s320/DSC_0047.JPG" /><br /><div>Like so many places, the inside of the building was distinctly uncomfortable. It was not built to be a welcoming place, and featured narrow corridors, cramped rooms, and impossibly steep staircases. The ceilings were plenty high, however, and it gave me a strange feeling of reverse-vertigo, for lack of a better term.<br /></div><div><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5350578888720459634" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8Ex903pJBKCgy-Y47N84B24Il0giKpV_LWizcOXW12NZXI2QhtRY7jUdBCJp_ekKmwvLk4fcNZb-CxRMK20oy7Cb1ilBt6UXwe0vItwXKeYlqriwHFMueqonp1T_LyTOSehYSjrQn3rw/s320/DSC_0068.JPG" /></div><div>This guy represented the city council, if I remember correctly, and he read a proclamation supporting our Journey.</div><div></div><div><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 213px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 320px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5350580287017185810" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhjGUhTJASRhhABRBrxfEeeL_2RCWPhUYX90JDQMneUaSh5mWSEPD6VgnNvcUCAQBmgMkJWiSaG8qTj_Da3Zu-vh4c3894G8ypkcGGPXcK5nADV61jifuycI4uhZ3ubNX2jBLUDboovg7w/s320/DSC_0085.JPG" /></div><div>This was our coordinator. She's hoping to become a musician, and sang a song for us. Also pictured is my new microphone, which I love dearly. Sweet, sweet <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_12" class="blsp-spelling-error">Sennhauser</span> D46. (Spelling and number might not be technically correct). </div><div> </div><div></div><div><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5350580299671575122" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhs1JOyd1-fE2ls5wbSo7U2XTkl4ztgUs4W2y7va_xrYYkoM9mDvyC7xIn6Mp__YwL_3JPYxSvPKWJqmeD7duaWnPsAVr-165tmlhTQbp_3YnJ7bRmQU8d73HlVCAwKh_1b_DuLNfp-_hc/s320/DSC_0108.JPG" /></div><br />Here's a close-up of the Hoop. Strangely, the head of an eagle materialized in the center. See it? Isn't that nuts?Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12256607085558454970noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8819126854900793189.post-14089782486902006212009-06-21T23:27:00.009-05:002009-06-23T15:41:55.448-05:00Sun Drop, History, and Cooked PigsMoving into Wisconsin, spirits began to resurge and we picked up a little momentum.<br /><div><div><br /><div>Our top priority was calming Don and Marlin, who had started becoming agitated a few days before by the increasing proximity of cheese curds and Sun Drop soda. According to Wikipedia, Sun Drop is a greenish-yellow beverage available in Wisconsin and limited sections of the American South, originally called "Golden Girl Cola." Cheese curds are basically squeeky cheese.</div><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 204px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 182px; CURSOR: hand" border="0" alt="" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/8/85/Sundrop.png" />When we crossed into Wisconsin, we stopped at the first grocery store we found, and there was deep disappointment at finding neither of these delicacies. Disappointment soon turned to anger, and all looked to be lost by the time we began driving through the Fond du Lac (Lake of Fond) reservation.</div><div><br /><div>And then, a high-fat miracle occurred. Somewhere in that particular reservation is a little lakeside resort. There are some trees, a number of cabins, and some inflatable tubes for the kiddies. If you've ever been anywhere in northern Minnesota, you know exactly what this resort looked like. What set it apart, however, was a little restaurant for the campers; a kitchen set aside for the talents of Chef Dave. The Dave. Famous Dave.</div><div></div><br /><div><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5350353607788377170" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDelnsY1bGUqgSw2YN9qsU2xtyXtJJ66gVIILzmVuE819StGv8-vH5kRMWTvMdt6kpBLCDnZg_kIEVICqgmE4h96ru_QW1-J6XwW2grXgx1aN23jstKqvk6zcJ7r2PzyP0iduOGH46XR4/s320/DSC_0002.JPG" /></div><br /><div>Yes, gentle reader, we had found the original Famous Dave's BBQ. We ordered five or six pigs and got the ONLY group picture of the entire journey.</div><br /><div></div><br /><div><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5350353614236397986" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhW8-wiawn_AZ1dxip7M47kESWbNWlY2jMT51V6fHPQslTOyS9Rmht7ZCJpq0QFkJ8mcBSQLyuZxCNczQlpLvPFf7W0ijtpGuE0n1oLoFNLTPJojr3UdqEE-IKuG0XEIFoaQtjswFIVQQI/s320/DSC_0009.JPG" /></div><br /><div>This was likely to be the last group photo, too, as Marlin's stomach exploded and we had to leave him behind by some rocks. He will be missed.</div><br /><div><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5350353617590159938" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmQg4wENkzFHLca1xcX0MLpxCmCc4SqgEhoDvDjrM9JcKwb3Up1T1Y2uP-_bzz_9sIIIQV8AvPQEl45byMfbIMyV4Tc_8uRMT3hzbr2xS3JnCQ2bI9OrlsDGWJJJYyqfb4YQBTTdTHhdY/s320/DSC_0010.JPG" /></div><br /><div>Despite the interlude of tasty barbecue, the simmering anger about Sun Drop continued. It was almost ready to make the jump into the "bargaining" stage when we (luckily) found a more appropriately-stocked grocery store the next town over. My van is now mostly devoted to carrying boxes of Sun Drop -- both can and bottle form.</div><br /><div></div><div>I'm going to warp time a little, here. We then had two stops in Wisconsin, which I'll write about later; for now I'm skipping ahead to the day we crossed into Michigan. When we crossed the border, we almost immediately pulled to the side of the road and spread out a picnic consisting of our suddenly-imported Sun Drop and curds. There was a plaque nearby commemorating a war between the Minnesota Ojibwe and the Michigan Menomene over timber and fishing rights, and Marlin was happy to explain how the Obijwe "kicked ass" in various key battles. This detail had been forgotten by the sign-maker, no doubt a Michiganian.<br /><br />Is Michiganian a word?<br /><br />When it was decided that cheese curds and caffeine were not enough to sustain us, Don begrudgingly brought out a pack of a dozen hot dogs he'd picked up somewhere, as well as some mustard. They were eaten cold, but somehow it fit the situation just right.<br /><br />At the conclusion of our picnic, Sun Drop was declared to be "off-brand ambrosia," which I though was much funnier than either Don or Marlin did. </div></div></div>Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12256607085558454970noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8819126854900793189.post-72508923489041814532009-06-21T21:42:00.003-05:002009-06-21T23:26:04.435-05:006/12 LEECH LAKE SCHOOL [Walker, MN]A rocky, rocky start to the day: something I did (or, more likely, wrote) burned up any good will the universe had towards me and I got to spend the night with somewhere between 1 and 30 mosquitoes in my room. As everyone who knows mosquitoes is aware, the exact number makes no difference: if it's greater than zero, you will not sleep and your face will itch in the morning.<br /><br />Also, for some reason, <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-error">Oorto</span> didn't want to be held. Now hyper-sensitive to her age, I worry that I might not see her, again, either. I'd have rather held her before I left. <br /><br />Arriving at the casino in Walker... whose specific name I cannot recall, as they're all the same... we were cordially welcomed into the space set aside for us: a big white tent set up in the parking lot. Although St. Stephen's High in Wyoming put up a fierce fight, I think this one takes home the grand prize for "Worst and Ugliest Setting."<br /><br /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5349979080072525442" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixkGXxmbrlCZszgcfzZMDb3V752NKrTiPgASY9YdwdURLTi08ywFBUtcQpY6EUkiM1pcxbvW2drXSCiGCpc3fT9kHmgkeK1cp-6lONSPuT5A-mMOP1mnnINJl7RipFqcgKeJOD5qwsXHs/s320/DSC_0350.JPG" /><br />Attempting to be proactive, I went inside the actual casino and asked if they had anything else available -- preferably something not in the parking lot, surrounded by cars and their hair-trigger alarms. This was, apparently, a very confusing question that required increasing numbers of people to answer. By the time the whole staff was involved in answering that question, we were already set up. Better yet, they never answered me, instead sending someone directly to Don, greeting him with: "We're ready to move you to a subbasement conference room." Don had no idea what they were talking about, and was a little upset by the message. To be fair, I only asked if there were other options, and expected a ten-second wait followed by, "I'm afraid not, sir." Anyways, I made up my mind to never be proactive again.<br /><br />We stayed in the tent. It was drafty and dark.<br /><br /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5349979082200652066" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjeOjxe_PQcSPmj3k4kmk7eVs90N6mbjNRSeN3F_Omex5SS2ViUginiZYQHw_31ekhUxS2dr3hdPzDwW9yWFyYunEgBeAdDC5RDEaPOWs1Go0_llNZv-f_LkngWOVpPwcmWk-wJE52a8zo/s320/DSC_0369.JPG" /><br /><br />Unsettling news began trickling in. Apparently, there was a serious communication failure somewhere along the line, and people couldn't find us. Few people had heard of us, and those that had didn't know where we were. Phone calls began coming in. People were going to former boarding schools in the area, then to the modern schools. Some people used the White Bison website, and were going to the casino. The first few were turned away at the gates by casino employees who didn't know we were there. Some people were calling the tribal council, who maintained that they'd never heard of us and, therefore, there was no official event.<br /><br />Somewhere between not sleeping, not liking the tent, and not liking how my attempt to be helpful had gone, this upset me greatly. I tried to get <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-error">someone's</span> ear about how valuable I thought it would be to investigate how this happened -- as well as to look into a general lack of successful advertisement -- but was rebuffed by frazzled Journey-<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-error">ies</span> who insisted we had no time and needed to trust the (sometimes lousy) local coordinators. I still think this bears investigation, but I grumpily withdrew and decided to be neither helpful nor proactive again.<br /><br />Adding to my frustration was my recent purchase of $400 worth of additional tapes for this project. They were sent to my house, and didn't arrive in time to pick up while I was there. Now, I'm out of tapes, and buying up whatever tapes I can find in Targets and <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-error">Wal</span>-Marts and the like. It's a bigger hassle, plus I now will have hundreds of dollars worth of tapes sitting at home when I get back that I guess I pay for out-of-pocket, as they're no longer a White Bison expense.<br /><br />Set-up was difficult, thanks to our power source of single extension cord running from the casino. (edit: this was later fixed, more cords were found by staff). The light kept shifting as the tent blew around, making lighting a mystery; plus the front of the tent was both cramped and the terminal end of a long, thin rectangle -- any equipment I set up was going to block <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_4" class="blsp-spelling-error">someone's</span> view. So, I moved stuff around a lot, set up lots of equipment, then had to take nearly everything down because the cords were creating a safety hazard; there were only so many places for people to walk, after all.<br /><br />Adding to the confusion was a demand that I take lots of pictures and hurry the transfer of anything I got. Apparently, Wayne had accidentally deleted Maria's pictures, and they needed replacements tout suite. I said I'd do what I could; no one really needed this extra wrinkle.<br /><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhi2_xhsxx-xx5loG9HzAsMJr3KbkGEVI36HqEs6ZXgkLrO5aoFtDlObvnmHwp13EcjT9LqamSDF7gXpUlXyBJlhxGtWgOOJr44IPx6hqB8f9e0F447_hyphenhyphenvBTsC5Uki0B5qwX5dOTrTuNk/s1600-h/DSC_0393.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5349979088419898162" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhi2_xhsxx-xx5loG9HzAsMJr3KbkGEVI36HqEs6ZXgkLrO5aoFtDlObvnmHwp13EcjT9LqamSDF7gXpUlXyBJlhxGtWgOOJr44IPx6hqB8f9e0F447_hyphenhyphenvBTsC5Uki0B5qwX5dOTrTuNk/s320/DSC_0393.JPG" /></a>Caption: It's not uncommon for a silent second person to stand next to the speaker. It's the other person's job to do the speaker's crying for them. Surprisingly, it seems pretty effective.<br /><br />The lighting grew worse and worse as the day went on, thanks to the changing position of the sun and frequent light rain bursts. I decided to abandon my earlier resolution to give up being proactive (giving up <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_5" class="blsp-spelling-error">proactivity</span>? <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_6" class="blsp-spelling-error">proactiveness</span>? <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_7" class="blsp-spelling-error">proactibility</span>?), and unhooked two of the panels forming the side wall of the tent. They were just tarps, basically, hooked to a metal frame. This let in more light for a minute or two -- then an ill-timed wind gust ripped the two loose tarps out and up, scaring the <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_8" class="blsp-spelling-error">beejezus</span> out of the woman who was speaking. She was saying something personal, when suddenly light floods in from all directions, combined with the noise of huge tarps being blown to high heaven. Casino staff poured around the loose panels and frantically tied them so securely that I had less light to work with than ever. It was not a shining moment, for me. Never again.<br /><br />A professor appeared and spoke for the second time -- we'd seen her somewhere previously, too. She's collecting boarding school stories and making short video interviews. I found myself jealous -- the thought of working in a controlled surrounding, with adjustable lights and no background noise... I'd be fine with what I was doing, now, if I didn't think it was so important. The things I'm filming deserve better-quality footage than could ever be obtained live; especially in a dark, ugly tent in a busy parking lot.<br /><br />And I suppose there's a silver lining in that thought. This was the low week of the Journey, but I guess I still believe that this is important work. That cheers me up, some.<br /><br />The morning progressed as per usual, more or less. Maria was nearly as tired as I was; apparently a man had wandered into her hotel room a little after midnight, lost and tipsy; she woke up from a sound sleep and was startled badly by the <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_9" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">silhouette</span> in her room. I could understand sleeping being difficult after that.<br /><br />When Don began his presentation, I excused myself and slept in the van; pillow wedged between the <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_10" class="blsp-spelling-error">seatbelt</span> and the window and knees pressed up against the dashboard. It was terribly uncomfortable, as always, but I felt more prepared to face the day afterwards. I guess Don gave a different presentation today; I missed it. Oops.<br /><br />During the open microphone segment, a man stood up who'd gone through a boarding school and later become a priest. He said that discipline was harsh for those caught speaking anything other than English; but, "they couldn't stop us from speaking unless they killed us." I'm sure he didn't realize, at the time, how lucky he was that his school wasn't one of the ones that practiced lethal discipline as a way of maintaining fear and order. He downplayed any contradiction in living a traditional life while still being a priest, saying that there was only one God, one Creator. Indians see his presence symbolized by an Eagle. Christians see his presence symbolized by a Dove. That's not enough of a difference to justify all the fighting, all the killing. I liked the sound of that logic; then again, any logic that is against murder is usually okay with me.<br /><br />The school at <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_11" class="blsp-spelling-error">Pipestone</span> was brought up again, here. Apparently, <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_12" class="blsp-spelling-error">Pipestone</span> was a nightmare school; one of the worst of the worst. Apparently, it was an original stop for the Journey, but it was dropped off the schedule by the time I signed up. I wonder why.<br /><br />I've forgotten which school was being discussed, my apologies. One woman talked about speaking with the elders of her tribe, and hearing many stories about being thrown into a dungeon as punishment. The details differed a little, but they all agreed it was a prison of total darkness. She searched the school in question, now closed, and they grudgingly agreed to let her see their cells. They travelled underground, and found two rows of small rooms with small grates set near the ceiling to let in light and air. These were unpleasant enough, but she believed the stories which all agreed there was no light whatsoever.<br /><br />After it had closed, the school remodeled into something else, and had run pipes through some of the old tunnels. Pulling back a loose rock where a pipe had busted through a wall, she discovered a lost room: a cold, dark, pit with a <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_13" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">decrepit</span> ladder running up to a false ceiling. Pushing back the ceiling, she uncovered a trap door leading to the former headmaster's private bathroom.<br /><br />Someone planned this. Someone built this for the purpose of literally dropping children into a dark, rock-walled pit. Some reported being left there for up to three days without food or light. Why the trap door led to a private bathroom brings up new questions, of course.<br /><br />In my pocket, I have a <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_14" class="blsp-spelling-error">GameBoy</span>. I feel an almost uncontrollable urge to pull it out during the open mic section. Thinking about this later, I've decided that I probably needed to feel like a hero for a few minutes, even if it were in a fantasy world. I don't feel like a hero at the moment. My people -- white, Christian, American -- have more blood on their hands than I ever dreamed. It's getting hard to take. To escape in a few moments of tiny electronic beeps and bloops is a whole lot easier than sitting still and facing... guilt. If the Indians are suffering from <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_15" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">intergenerational</span> trauma; Caucasians are suffering from <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_16" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">intergenerational</span> guilt. We've done terrible things for terrible reasons. The advantages I now enjoy are advantages that, somewhere back in the past, were taken from someone else.<br /><br />This is a Journey for Forgiveness; forgiveness alone will set modern-day Indians free from the anger that permeates many of these communities we've visited. But it is suddenly clear that it's the only thing that will set me free, too. As a dominant culture white American, I need this forgiveness as much as they need to give it. We all need forgiveness. We all need mercy.<br /><br />But it's so hard to give, and I suddenly suspect it's pretty difficult to openly accept, too. May God give us all strength.<br /><br />Pulling my attention back to the moment, I listen to a man talk about his grandmother. She was a boarding school student in 1900 in a place that sounded like "S Lake." (Estes Lake?) (<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_17" class="blsp-spelling-error">Ess</span> Lake?) The head priest was only there for a few years, but records indicate that he maintained a 100% rape rate among the female children. Damn, I wish I hadn't pulled my attention back to the moment. The urge to scream has been building all day; a <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_18" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">volatile</span> combination of sleeplessness, various immediate frustrations, and weeks' worth of compounded knowledge of a horrific past. A horrific recent past, in many cases. Maybe I should scream.<br /><br />Just when I'm about to crumple inside, the day is over. The drum starts up a recessional song for the Hoop, and volunteers carry it carefully outside of the tent. Standing near the drum, with its powerful rhythm hitting me in the back of the head, I look up. I can hear the wind outside the tent, and I can see it running across the ceiling-tarps, making waves, and paths, and little spreading ripples. I can't feel it, however, it's very still inside the tent. The drum beats on, and I watch the wind in my motionless space.<br /><br />Things are going to be okay.<br /><br />So, in all, the day worked out okay. The annoyances continued: I've never imagined anyone standing up in front of a group of strangers to discuss being beaten as a child, only to be interrupted by a family parking their car 30 yards away and '<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_19" class="blsp-spelling-error">chirrup'ing</span> their doors to make sure they're locked. Nor <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_20" class="blsp-spelling-error">someone's</span> story of alcohol addiction being put on hold while a car alarm goes off two lanes down from the tent. The tent housed a broken mechanical ladder-cart; and casino staff came in maybe five times during the day to try to fix it and drive it out of the tent. It was noisy and distracting. But, overall, things seem okay. We're doing something good, here; and it's supposed to be difficult in various ways. People are still sharing, and learning, and crying; I haven't screwed up anything that's affected that in any way, so the main job is still getting done.<br /><br />Plus I learned that we're not driving again until morning. That's a welcome break from tradition, and I look forward to the rest. Lunch included Walleye, and it was delicious. I've still got my <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_21" class="blsp-spelling-error">GameBoy</span> for the off-hours, and I can pretend to be a hero for a little while -- it's a soothing change of pace and I think it helps me keep my sanity. When I went home, I loaded up my <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_22" class="blsp-spelling-error">iPod</span> with new murder mysteries; those should make driving a little more enjoyable. I'll make it through okay, and sometimes the food is good. Things will be all right.<br /><br /><br />Today I learned that the Hoop's feathers can, under no circumstances, touch the ground. If they do, a special ceremony has been set up to "undo" it. I'll have to ask more about this, as it puzzles me.<br /><br />Jingle-Dress dancers were added to the closing ceremony today -- it's the first time we've seen them on the Journey so far. Marlin was absolutely adamant that they cannot be filmed or recorded in any way. Don, on the other hand, was shocked that we weren't highlighting them as a major part of the documentary. They'll need to work that out between them. Since we got to Minnesota, the rules have been changing unpredictably about what is and isn't okay to point a camera at. I don't understand, myself, but it's somehow reassuring that the other people on the Journey don't instantly agree. It means it's still subjective enough that I can make a mistake now and again without being lousy. Or immoral.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12256607085558454970noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8819126854900793189.post-28861915938679360202009-06-18T22:46:00.004-05:002009-06-21T23:27:02.635-05:00The Basic PatternEvery day starts with Wayne calling me on the hotel phone, never trusting that I've actually woken up. This is probably prudent. Then I stumble downstairs (I'm never on the first floor), and cram powder <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">biscuits</span> into my mouth until I can't swallow. This equals roughly a biscuit and a half. As best as I can tell, hotels no longer serve donuts. Then, I get a <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">Styrofoam</span> cup filled with orange juice from a machine that dispenses liquids with a sound like it's spitting mosquitoes in short, high-velocity bursts. Then, the five of us gather in the parking lot and spend a few minutes staring at each other; I've never been sure what this step is for, but we always hang out in front of the vans.<br /><br /><br />Then, irregardless of the current time, or the distance we need to travel, we go to find coffee to <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">supplement</span> the hotel breakfast coffee. Starbucks is the ideal choice. I will say I don't want anything, even a strawberry shake; then I will sit in the car and try to get a few more precious moments of sleep -- while Marlin will buy me a strawberry shake. Wayne will deliver the shake by rapping on my window four times with his knuckle.<br /><br /><br />We will struggle to get out of the Starbucks' parking lot, because I will hope that the van's turning radius has improved overnight. It will not have improved, and I will get wedged in a way that blocks the other vans. Wayne will get out of his car to direct me.<br /><br /><br />When we arrive at the site for the day, we will park. I will park poorly, because I will have hoped that the van's handling will have improved since Starbucks'. It will not have improved, and I will take up either 2 or 3 parking spots.<br /><br /><br />Then, we investigate our location. It will be either beautiful or condemned. My job is to check out four aspects: where the cameras should go, if we need speakers, where electricity is needed, and how the sound should be wired. These are exactly as interesting as they sound, so I'll skip over this part to preserve their innate mystique. The secret fifth responsibility is: "anything and everything else."<br /><br /><br /><br />Wayne and Maria will set up our table of things-we-sell-for-gas-money and our table of stuff-we-give-away. Don and Marlin will supervise and talk with the coordinator, hammering out the fine details of the schedule; the schedule will be discarded entirely within the first hour.<br /><br /><br /><br />One enduring struggle is about where the second camera should go. It must be within a few feet of the mixer if it's going to plug into it. The mixer must be close to Don's computer, which must be close to the projector, which must be in front of the screen. This would be easy enough, except that we have a procession and a recession, plus a large number of elderly people walking up to the mic -- there cannot be any loose cords on the floor to create a hazard. It's an added bonus if it's possible to set up the second camera in such a way that the view isn't terrible.<br />I hope that camera works out, overall. Even when it's wired into the mixer, the sound isn't perfect. In fact, it's got an enduring weird hum that I'm hoping will scrub out in post.<br /><br /><br />We will start late, and I will finish setting up seconds before we start.<br /><br /><br /><br />Marlin will have been canvasing the crowd, looking for veterans. The opening procession includes veterans with a wide variety of flags (national, state, and tribe, at minimum), two men and two women carrying the Hoop, and a child carrying Brandi Jo. They will circle the crowd, if possible; they will only approach the center from the East. The word is that everything good starts from the East. Personally, I can think of only two things: the sunrise and Japanese electronics, but those are both good things so the East is fine for me. If at all possible, a drum group will play a flag song or an honor song. The drum song is symbolically very important -- I'd like to add that, empirically, we have yet to do a ceremony without a drum that wasn't also disappointing.<br /><br /><br /><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-error">Someone's</span> cell will ring during the opening.<br /><br /><br /><br />The MC (often the local coordinator) takes the stage, and will likely somehow hold the microphone incorrectly. I will adjust the volume accordingly. This opening takes between 30 and 90 minutes, and is largely dedicated to thanking sponsors and attendees. There is about a 50% chance the MC will say some variant of, "I know there could have been more people here today, but that's not important. WE ARE HERE, and I thank you for being here." Often, local dignitaries are asked to say a few words. Almost always, an elder is asked to offer a morning prayer -- the form that this takes varies wildly by tribe and location.<br /><br /><br />Someone <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_4" class="blsp-spelling-error">else's</span> cell will ring during the prayer.<br /><br /><br />Don will be introduced. One can make at least a casual connection between how his name is pronounced and the overall quality of the event. "<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_5" class="blsp-spelling-error">Coyhis</span>" normally has two syllables, but it's been shrunk to one ("<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_6" class="blsp-spelling-error">Koys</span>") and bizarrely expanded up to four (<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_7" class="blsp-spelling-error">Coe</span>-Hoe-<span id="SPELLING_ERROR_8" class="blsp-spelling-error">Hoy</span>-His). Sometimes "Don" is mistaken to be "Dr."<br /><br /><br />Don will give his presentation. It varies a little each time, but follows a general pattern. When the Journey is done, I will probably make a video of his presentation to add to the White Bison website. It will also be posted here. His speech includes a short clip from a PBS documentary, which I'm almost sure falls under non-commercial Fair Use, but I'm still hoping no one calls us on. He's personal friends with most of the speakers in the documentary, and somehow that makes me feel better.<br /><br />Don will, at one point, refer to elders as having "wrinkles under wrinkles" and suggest that they make an elder pin-up calendar. It will get a laugh from no more than two people, irregardless of the size of the room. Everyone else will find the image uncomfortable.<br /><br />At this point, lunch will likely be served. I'm usually surprised by how elaborate this is. There is always a great surplus of food. Food, and lots of it, are given to everyone present -- with Haskell being the sole exception. I'm still a little bitter about that, which brings up a hidden lesson from the Journey: Forgiveness may set you free, but don't try it on an empty stomach.<br /><br />Post-lunch, we move into the Panel. The quality of this section makes a huge difference on my perception of the event; this is almost always the weakest part. This is also a section where I differ greatly from White Bison in my perception; I repeat that I do not speak for them.<br /><br /><br /><br />Why this section is called the Panel is a mystery, the only relation it bears to a panel or a panel discussion is that some people sit in a line. Seats in this line are given to the elders of the community, at least partially as an honorary position. They are each given time to share their thoughts individually; then the Panel ends without a question-and-answer or anything else you'd expect from its title. All too often, their thoughts are unrelated to what's actually going on; there's relatively little footage that's usable from almost six weeks of Panels, but lots of thoughts about Vietnam, how much money seventy cents used to be, and going swimming during the summer.<br /><br />Often, the people who are on-topic are incredible.<br /><br /><br /><br />I suppose this illustrates an aspect of Native culture that doesn't work for me: the assumption that age automatically brings wisdom. Just for writing that, I probably used up all of my karma; but I think Aunt Ollie is the only one reading this <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_9" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">regularly</span>, so maybe it'll be our little secret. I can see it working more easily in a traditional society during the period -- as Don calls it -- "a long time ago." There was a greater need for people to have <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_10" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">expertise</span> in various aspects of daily life. You couldn't just bead; you'd better know how to catch a fish and take care of a sick child, too. You wore many hats; and, as you aged, you got good at a lot of things. With age came experience and a lifetime of accumulated tips and tricks for doing things well.<br /><br />Today? Today I'm not so sure. With specialization, <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_11" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">globalization</span>, and an interdependent society, it's pretty easy to do just one thing: say, for example, short order cooking. So, you spend your life as a short order cook, mastering it in the first year and just continuing on after that, confident that someone else will make electricity, heal the wounded, dig the ditches, paint the lines on streets, and program the new software. When you get done at the end of the day, there's no real incentive to get out and learn something new, to master more skills. More likely, you'll watch "Wheel of Fortune." When you get old, you're pretty much still you, just older.<br /><br />This is not for a moment to say that we shouldn't respect old people. Everyone deserves respect; that's a basic part of the dignity of human life. What I find difficult is the assumption that being around for a long time naturally means that you have more to say than someone else. This is especially true in the modern world, where it's more possible than ever to work up a comfortable rut and grow old without diversifying or learning much new. For that matter, a lot of people's lives today don't even reward basic observation. How many people <em>of any age</em> can tell you nothing about the weather?<br /><br />Clear the slate; I'm starting this part over with a new approach. Elders deserve every bit of respect in the world; their insight is invaluable. However, not all Old People are Elders. Some Old People are just people who got old. It takes Wisdom to be an Elder. I'm pretty sure there were a few spots on the Panel, over the weeks, that were given to Old People.<br /><br />Wow. I am way off my original topic. Anyways, we spend maybe two hours on the Panel, where people speak irregardless of whether they have anything to say about boarding schools, families, or forgiveness. With what time is left, the microphone is opened up to anyone who feels they have something to say. I like this approach better -- targeting those with something to say -- but I speak only for myself.<br /><br /><br />The open-mic section is a complete <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_12" class="blsp-spelling-error">wildcard</span>, and has the largest range of possible outcomes. A scarce few people take this opportunity to hear their own voices. There's not many of them, but they each hold a special place in my heart as arch-enemies. Many people, in an amazing show of courage in front of strangers, are able to share stories from their past; most are heart-shattering. This, I think, is the part I was really hired to film. These stories are mostly hidden away, and they're simply devastating. There are often lots of tears during this section, from all ages and both genders.<br /><br />It makes me wonder how much of the world is hidden away. This is the only opportunity most people have ever had to speak <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_13" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">publicly</span> about this. What if there were forums for other topics? How many stories are never told, and lost forever?<br /><br /><br />If there is a graveyard nearby, especially if it's clearly long-neglected, we will walk over there and apologize to the children buried (or dumped) there -- we're sorry that you faced such abuse during your lives; we're sorry that you were left here, away from your homes and families; we're sorry that the graveyards are often so overgrown and forgotten today. Someone from the community who speaks the local language is called forward to ask the spirits to be free -- if the spirits are really there, this invitation will be in a language they know.<br /><br />I don't think it matters much if you believe this literally accomplishes anything or not; if you take part in this ceremony, you will be touched in some way. There were a lot of forgotten children, and it's a strange relief to know that someone acknowledges them: it's the release of a tension you never even knew was there before.<br /><br /><br />Finally, the ceremony ends with a chance for everyone present to make a short prayer in front of the Hoop. The way that this is carried out is decided by the local coordinator, according to local customs. Most often, this means forming a line that circles around the Hoop either clockwise or counter-clockwise; this usually includes making an offering of some kind of plant (tobacco is a frequent choice). But every place does things in their own way. Luckily, only one chose to send people up out of the audience individually to touch the Hoop, breathe in the smoke of burning sage, and sit back down before allowing the next person to stand. This particular approach took about two hours.<br /><br /><br />The ceremonies dissipate quietly, with people wandering away one at a time after praying by the Hoop. We will be far behind schedule, and the cleaning staff will want us gone. Usually, by this point I have packed my cameras and maybe my tripods. Maria starts packing our items-for-sale; Marlin and Wayne will carefully pack the Hoop, Brandi Jo, and the like; I pack all my equipment, anything electronic that we have, and everything left over. Don will be <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_14" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">besieged</span> by well-wishers and people wanting autographs and handshakes and the like. Don has gone this entire Journey with virtually no time to himself, as best as I can tell.<br /><br /><br />Each ceremony is supposed to get done somewhere between 2 and 4 PM. It will be 5 PM. It is always 5 PM when we end, no matter what we add or take away or change. We will have everything packed and stored by 5:10, at which point we will begin driving to the next town. The next town is likely somewhere between 4 and 6 hours away, and we will arrive in the dark, exhausted and aching, ready for a few hours of sleep before the alarms go off between 6 and 7 AM for the next day's ceremony.<br /><br /><br />They say nothing good is ever accomplished without sacrifice. We are our own sacrifice. And I think we're accomplishing something good.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12256607085558454970noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8819126854900793189.post-8368010348349888212009-06-18T20:57:00.003-05:002009-06-18T22:45:52.699-05:006/11 RED LAKE [Minnesota]<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcbVrKsUSI27CkKlj7s-wpN5kXK6b3LzogaSzZ3wEtolmoWzJIkxYtIGEVx6sOogY28VfOtN1VkquvJZOzHqfqZSAXQCrKLWiNuAedmVeJ2_v_gQ3O_K4OPMA49FLU0YBsh6azXlvxnMI/s1600-h/DSC_0315.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5348855652961967874" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcbVrKsUSI27CkKlj7s-wpN5kXK6b3LzogaSzZ3wEtolmoWzJIkxYtIGEVx6sOogY28VfOtN1VkquvJZOzHqfqZSAXQCrKLWiNuAedmVeJ2_v_gQ3O_K4OPMA49FLU0YBsh6azXlvxnMI/s320/DSC_0315.JPG" /></a>Patrick came along to help with this one, leaving me with more time to think and process. As a result, I resumed my long-since abandoned practice of taking notes during the ceremony, and may have more to say now as a result. Pictures will be few, as the lighting was lousy.<br /><br />Patrick and I left home plenty early, which was probably good as we drove past our destination at least once before successfully finding it. When we arrived, the person I talked to didn't know anything about us, but there was a gym which seemed to be set up for a presentation, so I assumed we were in the right place and started setting up. <br /><br />After ten or fifteen minutes, I started to worry. Security guards kept entering by the bleachers, watching us, then leaving. There was no sign of the rest of the group. The cameras were set, Patrick was working on sound, and I began assembling the lights.<br /><br />Another twenty minutes went by. We couldn't find the light switch for the gym, so we'd been working in darkness all along. No sign of anyone. I used my roll of gaffer's tape to make sure every last wire was stuck in place. The event was supposed to officially start in a little over a half-hour. Patrick gave up on their sound system, which featured lots of heavily-frayed wires and bent plugs. We began setting up our own sound system.<br /><br />And, then, validation finally came. It turns out we were in the right place all along; however, we'd entered during the narrow window when the door was unlocked to let the staff in to other parts of the building. Everyone else, along with some local volunteers, had been waiting by the front door for 20-odd minutes hoping someone would let them in.<br /><br />Unfortunately, once they arrived it was decided that it would be better to have everyone facing a different direction than I had assumed we would use. All of my preparations were for naught and had to be stricken completely. All we really accomplished in that time, then, was deciding that the gym's sound system was worthless. Hooray for us!<br /><br />On the whole, it was a good ceremony, and helped rebuild my energy and enthusiasm for the Journey. If you're just tuning it, I was in an emotional low spot for the last couple entries. <br /><br />***It's probably worth mentioning, now that I think about it, that I do not speak for White Bison. I'm sure they met their objectives at each location, and were much better at seeing the positive. My objectives are always different from theirs: I want good film footage. My negativity is not their stance, it's mine. End disclaimer.***<br /><br />Don changed his opening speech to discourage people from using up valuable time to talk about how great the local schools were. When I talked to him about it later, he didn't remember doing that. Curious. We had decided at a recent stop that a lot of the "everything was fine" people loved their boarding schools because it was a chance to get out of their abusive homes. The deadly irony here is that their homes were abusive <em>because</em> their parents went to boarding school. Those schools were very good at what they did; they even made themselves indispensable to future generations by removing all other options.<br /><br />One woman ran away from home at 16 so she could join a boarding school in Oklahoma. For reasons unspecified, she later ran away from boarding school, making it all the way to northern Kansas on foot before being apprehended. Her search for a stable life was a difficult one.<br /><br />One of the first speakers talked about how critical forgiveness has been in her life. This set an excellent tone -- the first speakers matter so much.<br /><br />One elder, aged 68, still has marks running up and down her legs from being whipped by nuns as a child. The most moving part of her speech was when she broke down on the line: "And they pretended to be good people." It took two tries due to the flood of bitter tears. They pretended to be good people. Looking at it on paper, I realize sadly that it will never have the same effect as hearing her say it. It was chilling and heartbreaking the way she spoke.<br /><br />Another woman was able to recognize the damage that her own anger has done to her, and how her childhood experiences shaped her life. This showed immense self-awareness, and it was pretty impressive. The crux of her story came when she was in a physical dispute with her white husband, and suddenly a lifetime of repressed, hidden pain and anger came rushing out. "To all the white people of the world, from me," she said to her husband just before she "beat the crap out of him" with a frying pan. This was a point of ultimate decision, for her. She had two paths: the easy one would be to continue as-is, becoming an increasingly desperate and bitter human being, the almost-impossible choice was to identify the buried anger and learn to forgive as a way of letting it go. The fact that she was able to speak today indicates that she's done something incredibly difficult and come out a much better person for it. As cool as that is, imagine how much better her life would have been if she didn't have a reason to shape her first 20- or 30-odd years around hatred of white people and acceptance of violence as a solution to problems.<br /><br />To put it another way, it's amazing that you were able to hold your breath for that long -- but that doesn't make the fact that someone was holding you under water any less awful.<br /><br />Looking back, it occurs to me now that men were pretty severely underrepresented. I wonder what that means. One of the men who spoke took me aside beforehand and made me promise to turn the cameras off, take no pictures, and write no notes while he was up front. I'm not sure if he was secretive or lost his nerve, because what he finally said wasn't likely to be something I'd write about (or remember), anyways. I suppose there's a valuable lesson in there about how important everyone's world is to themselves. Each of us knows only our own experience, and it's hard to remember (or understand) how something so important to you could be so uninteresting to everyone else.<br /><br />The irony of writing that last sentence <em>on a blog</em> is not lost to me.<br /><br />I had the impression there were some horror stories that stayed hidden. Almost everyone who spoke in Red Lake talked about "trauma" and their "experiences," but almost no one gave any specifics. Even the allusions seemed difficult for people to vocalize. This is obviously a hurting community. As I'm sure most readers of this blog are aware, Red Lake is the home of one of the deadliest school shootings in American history. Judging by people's reluctance to divulge details, it was probably also home to a lot of children who grew up knowing terrible things. When they had kids of their own, that trauma passed right along through their parenting. The tragic results are clear.<br /><br />Usually, when someone is having a particularly difficult time speaking, Marlin will stand next to them, holding burning sage. Today, for the second time, Marlin replaced the sage smoke with the Forgiveness Staff. It calmed people considerably. Interestingly, it was never meant to be the Staff's purpose -- it was meant to stay stationary in its stand. Its use in this fashion was never discussed, and it wasn't used that way for the first several weeks. Suddenly, however, it just felt right; no one's ever questioned its use as a form of comfort.<br /><br />One speaker gave their observations on how religion's use in the schools hindered moral development. What should have been taught, early in these childrens' lives, was: "Whatever religion you are, whatever you believe in, this is what you respect." In other words, dogma replaced an understanding of respect and basic goodness. I liked the way it was said.<br /><br />One woman talked about going into near-shock (as an adult) when she realized that one of her friends was a nun. She'd grown up associating Catholics with extreme physical violence and little else. Only very recently has she been able to see any other side. This depresses me. There's a long-standing Catholic belief in accepting sinners, welcoming them to you and finding the good in them. I believe this. I also, however, believe that our best hope of redeeming our name is to expose and remove people like these corrupt nuns who broke childrens' bones to keep them in line. How does one reconcile those two impulses? We can't be a collection of the worst the world has to offer; but we can't presume to pass judgement on other mortals and must love even the lowest sinner. I like the sound of "lover the sinner, hate the sin," but our collection of sinners have done terrible, terrible things to children in God's name. It bothers me greatly.<br /><br />Father Pat, the local priest for Red Lake and for my own parish of Nebish, was in attendance. Apparently, he's just been transferred, and this was perhaps his last appearance in Red Lake after 12 years. While he's a good man, and certainly works hard, he contributed to my gradual removal from church services at home due to a largish personal struggle he has: his almost complete inability to plan ahead. The last time I went to church at home must be about ten years ago. He hadn't planned a homily, so he flipped through a Reader's Digest to see if there was anything worth using as a topic while the entire congregation waited. I didn't go again after that day: it was a final straw for me. Not surprisingly, this manifested today, too. He gave a difficult and heartfelt apology to the people in attendance for the abuses committed against them by men of the cloth -- this was exactly the right thing to do. It appeared, however, that he didn't start thinking about what he was going to say until after he had already been handed the microphone. I have it on videotape: a full four-minute pause where he stands and thinks in silence. That's a long, long time to hold the mic without saying anything. Of course, when he did speak, he had good words to say; he usually does. They just weren't planned and everyone else was stuck waiting.<br /><br />I wish Father Pat the best in his new assignment. He's a good man; I hope someday he's able to realize the damage he does to his own image by disregarding the value of other people's time. A little preparation would do wonders for him.<br /><br /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5348855650439304786" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPxZTw13odMc4BUtQ4_x2z-nbygvYiFmqR6iKJEC7m-S7_QgiEW4NvzfAHUCAUgh_haXP1oGFXZ-_pigAcZsIPY2qMu93VNAz6tvgYHlM14lmlmL3WTaEj3jAmVeIfU1FlzY90cp91kmg/s320/DSC_0177.JPG" />On a side note, if you haven't heard Don speak, find a way to do so. It's worth your time. Here's a picture.<br /><br />It was a difficult space to work in, today. The lighting was poor, it was difficult not to get in the way, and there was no ventilation to speak of so it quickly become unpleasantly smoky. Someone with asthma might have had a difficult time breathing. Counterbalancing that, however, was the wild rice stuffing that was served as a side dish during lunch. It might be my favorite thing to eat so far. Man, that was good stuff.<br /><br />During lunch, I also noticed that today was the first time since Arizona that I looked like I had a sunburn that was peeling. Every day up until this point, it looked like I had redish skin and severe leprosy. This is a good change of pace.<br /><br />One thing that was particularly fun about this stop was how many people in the audience I recognized. With Patrick helping, I could take a somewhat-extended lunch and mingle with the crowd a little. There were probably nearly ten friends or family-friends that I was able to catch up with; it's important not to forget the value of having a circle of friends. Lunch was very soothing, that way; endless procession of meals with strangers in strange towns never felt as good.<br /><br />I suddenly realized I forgot to add something to the White Earth post; specifically, Katie Houg was there. She's been a globetrotter for a year or two, now, and just returned to the States. She still smells a little of New Zealand, South America, and the numerous places in-between that she's been calling home. But everyone knows that this is REAL home. Welcome back, Katie.<br /><br />The day ended with a disappointment. After all the sudden whirl, Patrick decided to formally back out of joining the Journey. I might have done the same, myself, if it had been an option when I first experienced the hectic pace and distressingly-malleable "planning" we live on. Luckily for me, however, I was in Oregon when I realized how difficult this really is; Patrick was only a few miles from home. So, he's going to visit his girlfriend and start his job, as planned. We move on without him.<br /><br />I haven't seen much of Patrick the last few years; but each time I'm impressed by how much he's grown up. I think a trip like this might have given me some insight into the man who almost certainly isn't the same little boy I grew up with. He guarded his privacy during high school and college, and changed a lot. I hope some other opportunity comes up in our lifetimes.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12256607085558454970noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8819126854900793189.post-50767348036355141542009-06-18T20:44:00.004-05:002009-06-21T23:27:47.174-05:00Jiggety-JigPatrick drove me home after White Earth, giving me a chance to spend a night in my own bed. It was pretty surreal suddenly being home. There was no "break" with the previous schedule -- heck, the previous LIFE I had been living. One minute I was on my knees by the feet of a presenter, frantically trying to rewire their microphone so their voice stopped distorting; the next I was in my living room. It was surprisingly jarring.<br /><br /><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-error">Tigger</span> had been buried the previous day. I went out and looked at the spot for a while, although there was little to see: just some disturbed earth, no different from the half-dozen holes dug by our puppy in the front lawn. <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-error">Oorto</span> seems skittish and hides from imaginary threats by crawling under furniture. Mom suggests that she misses the sense of security her physically much-larger brother provided. Poor <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-error">Oorto</span>. She seemed to appreciate any attention I could give her.<br /><br />A week or so back, Patrick had offered to join the Journey as we passed through Minnesota. He would be a volunteer, and would even pay his own way with lodgings and meals. Well, lodgings shouldn't be a problem, as I had double beds to myself most nights, anyways. His goal would be to help me drive and keep an eye on the sound quality. When it was first brought up to the group, it was dismissed out-of-hand. Everyone was exhausted and overworked, and I think the thought of even a tiny increase in coordination was overwhelming. I passed the information on to Patrick, and he made other plans.<br /><br />At White Earth, he helped out with photography and clean-up, and must have done something impressive because the issue was suddenly brought up again. In fact, he received a formal invitation to join. Now back home, he's on-the-fence about what to do. He's got about 24 hours to decide before we're gone again. I think he's smarting a little from the first rebuff, plus he's scheduled his new job to start and planned a weekend getaway with his girlfriend. To use Mom's pun: he'd go in a second if not for those reservations.<br /><br /><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-error">Hehe</span>... good one, Mom.<br /><br /><span id="SPELLING_ERROR_4" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">Unfortunately</span>, there's no sign of the tapes I ordered or the tripod I left in <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_5" class="blsp-spelling-error">Anadarko</span> which was supposed to be mailed to me. The rest of the Journey is going to have to be without a microphone stand; and I'll have $400 worth of tapes sitting in my room when I get back, plus I'll have to buy another $400 worth on-the-road. Grumble, grumble...Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12256607085558454970noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8819126854900793189.post-28257127330470166642009-06-18T19:14:00.004-05:002009-06-18T20:43:32.981-05:006/10 WHITE EARTH [Minnesota]<div><div>It feels good to be back on friendly soil. Minnesota, I've missed you. I've missed gas stations where you can pay after you pump, where it's all self-service, and who sell magazines inside. I've missed water. I've missed towns I can pronounce. I've missed strong expressions of support being masked by negating negatives (It's not as bad as I thought!). I've missed being able to understand the locals the first time they say something.<br /><br /><div><div>Car problems in Texas: "Did you check your awl?" (BAD)<br />Car problems in Minnesota: "Didja check your oil?" (GOOD) </div><br /><div>I don't really spend much time in White Earth, although I've been told that the White Bison office is planning on writing up this stop as my return to my homeland or some such. So, look for that. They have a gorgeous tribal facility there; I say "facility" because I didn't get a good sense of what it was used for outside of the meeting room we borrowed. Parts looked kind of museum-y, parts seemed to be governmental... and there were several meeting rooms. Anyways, it was a beautiful structure.<br /></div><br /><div>Now a few days behind on blogging (go figure), my memories of White Earth are fading quickly.<br />What I do remember is that my family drove down to attend; it was very good to see them all again. This is also the first time I'd seen Patrick in a long time, and he didn't seem terribly miffed that I'd missed his college graduation a few days earlier. </div><div><br /></div><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5348844332949724098" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbIvFoOF64-Mc1ofdH77T14FyYCPdUGu2rfHAIIH-G0b_bheOW35DQyqVs0IOygnP3XIkUTCxQHDnr7EsvL-iwSdg61hXxW-2wGRqsZjuaorWWkOMyWjCDI1wq7eBS6XAa6Lac2FRhSAE/s320/DSC_0816.JPG" />My mother is much smaller than Don.</div><br /><div></div></div><br /><div><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5348844328248490754" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgU5yyYIW2Ion9giow_ySTAiQsLWKKl9lG2hgtmdHJkTzB7bhfamNCSin3K6IcIT98PMa1kZ959WqRetZ4bRNWQJ7j2OU_3C8jQNhnDAEdyQPf17NeF1PY93UidFsYNfNPIvx8SSip38SA/s320/DSC_0784.JPG" /></div><br /><div>For our M.C., we wanted someone comfortable in front of a crowd. Andy Favorite is a storyteller by nature and occupation. And so, everything he said was interesting and well-said; unfortunately, he said nearly everything that was possible to say. Missing the increasingly less-subtle clues that he should wrap up his stories or stick to the topic, we listened to the history of timber harvesting until the kitchen staff (in desperation over their rapidly-cooling meal) just started dishing up food as a way of starting the long-overdue lunch.</div><br /><div>I'd love to sit down with him sometime and just listen to him talk. Now wasn't that time, however; I'm not sure what timber harvesting had to do with anything, either.<br /></div><div><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5348844339709218610" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5CywG3-_FXWuv2E1Sw9AImCZVWL9HmmeDe9PvFDwL7UxJGfNwd5bdJRA2aoyj_QbKVFSCVaSm-yxi_4QW0EYmfFFSL2e2K2puLrEDiwp_VDwKlkbJ48FFjG2nPBciC3mW0surbkqvgg4/s320/DSC_0008.JPG" />Two elders look at... something?</div><br /><div><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhW-wB08GfPAZARrUMFWLFZ4SdqoO0YlML18x0XDmWhlsAU8SbxOnCziDMD-ysWOa7wSQ3OmjXqYugRSV5hZUsRDcmceV4pFZ9Bdzt4QqRXBpVxTpZRMcE4o2lgwprZgC7KbjwLnzSw7nY/s1600-h/DSC_0066.JPG"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5348846684700224914" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhW-wB08GfPAZARrUMFWLFZ4SdqoO0YlML18x0XDmWhlsAU8SbxOnCziDMD-ysWOa7wSQ3OmjXqYugRSV5hZUsRDcmceV4pFZ9Bdzt4QqRXBpVxTpZRMcE4o2lgwprZgC7KbjwLnzSw7nY/s320/DSC_0066.JPG" /></a></div></div><br /><p>The ceremony ended with the gift of two bricks to Don: relics from the ruins of the original boarding school in White Earth. I think I've captured the exact moment where Don realized he didn't have any idea what he was supposed to do with two bricks.</p><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh12zup-ZfeNwyQUwiaNgtM_9ziCvqAHbmL1ZS-SG8oOPVWSjzCWedMSBAcCZjrOxMTtoVzjHlYizsdxClPU6EM38khSDJv-xSYJ5-SpnMKqo3k6xxZvFlh8_NoHkJ8XiTKP4cQZa99_KQ/s1600-h/DSC_0066b.jpg"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 213px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 320px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5348848072183810930" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh12zup-ZfeNwyQUwiaNgtM_9ziCvqAHbmL1ZS-SG8oOPVWSjzCWedMSBAcCZjrOxMTtoVzjHlYizsdxClPU6EM38khSDJv-xSYJ5-SpnMKqo3k6xxZvFlh8_NoHkJ8XiTKP4cQZa99_KQ/s320/DSC_0066b.jpg" /></a><br /><p></p><br /><p>Seriously, though, we're going to take them to Washington, have them blessed, then bring them back. They will become part of White Earth's proposed "Healing Wall," based on the Vietnam Wall. Each brick will have a story or something -- these two will form part of the foundation.</p>Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12256607085558454970noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8819126854900793189.post-48496121009274382232009-06-15T00:33:00.008-05:002009-06-18T20:15:23.331-05:006/9 FLANDREAU [South Dakota]<img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5348839953068563122" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7KxtprYmMiYVzwpXC2lDvqCjUlxBf0DYZIZzq0YH89YenwAbP-CldloQytia9Cf9ySF23K7cQfzJwNATMxJbDZZDAV_-iOxxMzTLjXrESz-EGnNupUhW3cEarQAbi6U31t4OINZWgUZQ/s320/DSC_0607.JPG" />This was a somewhat-unscheduled stop. It wasn't part of our original intinerary, certainly, and never even got added to the White Bison website. As I understand it, there was a strong request from Flandreau that we stop by; even if just for a moment. This gets routed through several proper channels before it reaches our ears (and it reaches my ears a day after everyone else's), and we're left with a sense of a "strong request" without much information about who or where it came from: the city council, a corp of volunteers, the school board, or a single lonely shut-in who thought he was ordering pizza over the phone. <div><div><br /></div><div>So, we shifted course yet again and planned to stop by and maybe say a prayer or two before moving on and getting a good night's rest. Silly us. As we got closer and closer to the school, more and more information trickled in about the preparations that had been made and the expectations that the local coordinators had. And so we added an extra day's worth of ceremony to our docket and sadly watched our night's rest flutter away like a wounded sparrow. At least, I did -- the sparrow-thing, that is. Don and Marlin are fired up about being able to reach another community. Me, I just miss sleep.</div><div><br /></div><div>As part of this juggling for Flandreau and Rapid City, one of our established stops -- Morris, Minnesota -- was forced off the list. Everyone felt pretty badly about this. We just can't do any more. We can't. Sorry.</div><div><br /></div><div> </div><div>Flandreau was a common location for Indian children from Minnesota. Moving them to schools in Minnestoa made it too easy for them to run home, but moving them cross-country was too expensive. Flandreau was the compromise, and a lot of Minnesotans were sent there. It also appears to have cleaned up its act some time ago -- or so they say -- and is a respectible educational institute now. This means the people with the most meaningful stories are now elders, and live in another state. Additionally, I suspect the coordinator "stacked the deck" and lined up a panel of speakers who all have close ties to the school; for example, it employs their children.</div><div><br /></div><div>To give credence to the deck-stacking theory, the coordinator picked enough people to sit on the elders' panel that there was no time for open mic. Furthermore, one of the "elders" was younger than me; a recent graduate who had nothing of any interest to say: "Yeah, it was a good time. I learned a lot of stuff. It was good."</div><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5348839967669115810" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMsxkmIZq97-wOTjWlxx1nYLXZylrTlxwO7xlxZjvtIiAHdJ79dWOz66glLccTNBc6EHHOc0dqW_SWtaX7BXeEDRCfV8N2_NX2jRMnKorcMiUWaySY9MaVeaul8XCaj7gxQ3RpldBv8Rw/s320/DSC_0717.JPG" /> Caption: Flandreau was pretty awesome, I guess. Yeah.</div><div><br /><div>And so, a guy named Sid (Cid?) had a wonderful opening speech, Don gave his presentation with his usual levels of greatness, then we sat around for a few hours and listened to some canned statements about how great the school is and was and always has been.</div><br /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5348839957314148850" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_pDu6ITvJEmFvfL8vNIVbL4-EKc8jXX7yGfIIg4VLQLi_mOv_0pY2O5X0brcBXvtC9rZKb1bOdDKd9YzT1GlzGQqzoHqkfEB-5C19Ip5mFWwHslTvYKBXCvIk3C16_IHAZHAHXc5l8IE/s320/DSC_0645.JPG" /> Caption: Sid was great.<br /><br /><div></div><br /><div>It's the same old conundrum: we're not here to focus on the negative, or dredge up the worst of the past for no reason. Sparks of hope and levity are absolutely critical. But we're here to try to do healing work; why ask us to come at all if you claim to have nothing to forgive?</div><br /><div>In sum, we learned that Flandreau is the best place in the world; for that we skipped Morris.</div><br /><div>The one upside is that the walls of the cafeteria, where we were set up, were plastered with huge posters of hot women advertising milk. So, uh, that was a plus, I guess.</div><br /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 240px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5348839965965524722" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilvs97JBk8nx_x5MHnxbKOfwqnvaQgyqq2nHIUamZfrctIyhKRxgcGr6l6Af_eVbojk8UuuQq7518T3XtLMFVUpxz3mZQ6fnmP0U5cUm3iC7CNv2y71TJ_2OGqhW_pLPXntbALFFn9Yt0/s320/wallpaper_ivanovic_800.jpg" /><br /><div><div>One last oddity: they didn't seem to want us to go in the front door, so we all entered in through the kitchens. They were standard industrial kitchens, which made for an odd entryway.</div><br /><div>I slept a little the night before, so I'm less grumpy; I wouldn't say I'm 'perky' yet.</div></div></div>Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12256607085558454970noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8819126854900793189.post-84715439183099109922009-06-15T00:26:00.002-05:002009-06-15T00:32:06.376-05:00Rest In Peace, Wade Johnson<a href="http://www.adventurefilm.org/Images/Search/Jonny-Micah-Wade.jpg"><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 580px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 348px; CURSOR: hand" border="0" alt="" src="http://www.adventurefilm.org/Images/Search/Jonny-Micah-Wade.jpg" /></a>Far Right: Wade Johnson. Also shown: The other two members of the wiped-out base camp.<br /><br /><div>As we closed in on Minnesota, I started to drift off at the wheel. For the only time so far, I felt I needed to pull the caravan over and get Don to drive my car. I ended up sleeping for hours. It helped my mood even further; which was good because of a sudden shock at a gas station. According to the front page of the Star Tribune, a guy I knew in college, Wade Johnson, had also gone into filmmaking after graduation -- he had just been killed while filming a documentary about mountain climbing.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5j9XeNbDfzG_-BTaVgvW1u7avC7dAD98MKACG2">http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5j9XeNbDfzG_-BTaVgvW1u7avC7dAD98MKACG2</a><br /><br />I didn't know Wade well, but we'd crossed paths a couple of times over the years -- enough that I recognized his picture almost immediately. He was very outdoorsy, and worked at the climbing wall. I think I might have taken a lesson on rock climbing from him, once. We had a film class together, although I'm not sure we ever spoke. I'm pretty sure he cooked some food for a fundraiser that I attended at one point.<br /><br />So, I suppose I really didn't know Wade much at all; but even now, in another lifetime and several years later, I still have a clear impression of someone who loved adventure, who had great enthusiasm for the natural world, and who was just generally a good sort of guy. To leave that impression, after our brief time together, speaks well of him.<br /><br />And he was, I just learned, a fellow filmmaker. A filmmaker in search of the story on that mountain, killed by an avalanche when he was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. According to the paper, he was trained and skilled at mountain safety; one expert was quoted as saying, "Sometimes [. . .] you just get unlucky."<br /><br />What could be more tragic? Struck down by bad luck on the side of a mountain. Just pure bad luck.<br /><br />Rest in Peace, Wade.</div>Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12256607085558454970noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8819126854900793189.post-87322936279064192332009-06-14T23:53:00.004-05:002009-06-15T00:26:19.223-05:00Wagons East, Over the Exact Same PathLeaving behind the worthless cul-de-sac that was (and is) Rapid City, we crossed the entire state of South Dakota, again, trying to get back on the path that we'd abandoned to make a special trip for some reason.<br /><br />I listened to music, loudly, and screamed all the lyrics I knew. When we reached our stop, I slept in all my clothes and was out for a long, long time.<br /><br />Things seemed better in the morning. I was ready to face the world again, and it didn't look quite so gloomy anymore.<br /><br /><br />Sioux Falls is home to Scooter's Coffee, which proudly boasts "The World's Worst Coffee and Tea," at least according to Don, Marlin, Wayne, and Maria. I can't verify it, myself, as I sat in the car listening to music that particular day. Scooter's Coffee was bad-mouthed for days, and has a chance of slowly growing into an urban legend.<br /><br />Most mornings, we stop at Starbucks; irregardless of what I say or whether I come in or not, Marlin buys me a Strawberry Frappuchino. He's a nice guy, that Marlin. As best as I can tell, it's really just a shake -- except it's for breakfast, has caffeine, and costs more. I can't see myself going out of my way to get one, but if Marlin's going to keep handing them to me, I'm willing to count it as one of the perks of the job; besides showing how concerned Marlin is that I'm not left out of the morning coffee run. That feels kinda nice, too.Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12256607085558454970noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8819126854900793189.post-28782314679379570312009-06-14T23:25:00.004-05:002009-06-18T20:16:22.398-05:006/8 MOTHER BUTLER CENTER [Rapid City, SD]To his day, I have yet to come up with a good thing to say about Rapid City, South Dakota. I've been trying for years.<br /><br /><div><div></div><div>This was the absolute nadir of the Journey, for me. Granted, I was not in a good place, mentally, <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">physically</span>, or in the sense of being in Rapid City. Besides being exhausted from a long day's drive the previous day and another poor night's sleep, and heartbroken over the loss of my kitty, nothing seemed to go well today.</div><div> </div><div></div><div>We got out of the hotel a little later than expected, then stopped for coffee, as is our usual routine. Since I usually have the most set-up, and don't drink coffee, I wasn't in the mood for this routine. It was, apparently, terrible coffee; that left everyone a little grumpy.</div><div></div><div> </div><div>On first stepping inside the building, we were greeting by some guy yelling at us about using a different door. This was promising. We then entered into a long, narrow room with long, narrow tables running its length. This was to be our room, with our space being on one of the extreme ends and everyone else sitting facing <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_1" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">perpendicularly</span> to us at a great distance away. This was even more promising. To add to the <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_2" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">allure</span> of the experience, the room decorator took the bold step of choosing to evoke a sickly, dying version of a 1970s middle-class kitchen.</div><div> </div><div></div><div><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5347406672807176946" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBrkdIFngXQFO4VpSRLZqIBwdZ-XrbDOaGIQr1NCq0rIFGmF3F2uTOgkhhFhLmYOlr2Fr12GwhgCrCTfrSw9W9tV85x3GHXd3jTAESAb2wZOzj3MreJrFSe8n67737hcsmtHwPhmmlrCQ/s320/DSC_0465.JPG" /></div><div></div><div>This was one of the most work-intensive set-ups of the entire trip, for me, as the room had nothing prepared and the walls were too cluttered and hideous to project anything against. So, I set up the cameras, as usual; but also the speakers, the sound mixer, the lights (it was dark in the back), all the extension cords, and my green screen -- turned to cover up the emergency exit and leave some space for projection. Then the wireless mic started malfunctioning. Then the speakers (heavy) needed to be moved. Twice. Then the lights needed to have the bulbs checked, as they were acting oddly. Then I had to work out a deal with the guy on the upper floor who was planning on using the day to run his floor buffer. Then we ran out of batteries...</div><div></div><div> </div><div>Luckily, timely success or failure really didn't mean jack, as no one showed up, including the original coordinator -- she had gone on vacation. The new coordinator, after maybe an hour of waiting, got out her cell phone and started calling everyone in her address book to see if anyone wanted to "stop by." Three hours after the start-time, there were enough people to carry the Hoop and the Staff, so we went through the whole ceremony, finishing late.</div><div> </div><div></div><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 320px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 213px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5347406677645128994" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAQcpSGhKa-BmXoCSB5nB7d68AndgoZxvXZNdwJDEBqqj0tOxExQsrDWLm6GhIxU5xWBsawtIBdk1kHF-A1JSrFD_q9J8VLAYBIrGeeH7Hdg16Dlnvbc1zch1mykqjVlDIOXCaHWKe6OE/s320/DSC_0470.JPG" /><br />Looking at my pictures, I guess some people spoke. I don't remember anything of what they said. Then it was time to drive back across the entire state of South Dakota for our next ceremony. I couldn't remember what I was doing on this trip. I wanted out. I wanted a full night's sleep. I wanted to bury my cat. I wanted to show up in a town and feel welcomed; to work hard for the benefit of appreciative people. I wanted badly to shoot some film in something other than "live" conditions; to not have my labors give fruit to hours of film with ugly backgrounds, <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_3" class="blsp-spelling-corrected">inconsistent</span> lights, and speakers who wander around while they talk, going in-and-out of focus and dropping out of the frame entirely if I happen to be tending the other camera.</div><div></div><div> </div><div>I hate Rapid City, and this whole Journey isn't looking so hot, either.</div>Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12256607085558454970noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8819126854900793189.post-75640939077261914472009-06-14T23:10:00.004-05:002009-06-14T23:24:38.060-05:00Wagons WestSomewhere around here it started to sink in that our schedule was impossible. We needed to be on opposite ends of South Dakota, and we couldn't do it unless HQ finally bought us that jet we'd been asking for. So, with a flurry of increasingly stressed-out phone calls, it was decided that Rapid City, SD, wanted us more than Morris, MN, and we set out from the eastern end of the state all the way over to Rapid City. This was, mind you, a full day of driving done with the knowledge that we'd need to cross the whole distance again to get back on track.<br /><br />Maria rode with me, ostensibly to cheer me up; I was pretty bummed out about <span id="SPELLING_ERROR_0" class="blsp-spelling-error">Tigger</span>. She had an amazing computer gadget thingy that gave her decent Internet in places where I couldn't so much as make a phone call. Realizing I'd need tapes, I dictated step-by-step instructions for finding and ordering the correct tapes through Amazon while she followed along. This distracted us for long enough that we were some forty-five minutes down the road before we realized that the other two cars had stopped miles and miles back.<br /><br />It took a few hours to get everyone back together. We stopped for them, and they overshot, then we caught up to their new stopping place, but couldn't find them... Anyways, watch out for snakes.<br /><br /><br /><img style="TEXT-ALIGN: center; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; WIDTH: 361px; DISPLAY: block; HEIGHT: 245px; CURSOR: hand" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5347402104049898034" border="0" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgaCaA-q1U8rN2aLpNGfWh5wkQAyLsb_RZqwbqly2EKHu1zC5oUIgmWT_Uvl306I2_6PWyeKOCLma3IuWCYs1CAtNHRSJkIdSZZ8uvEhPUK2dylq6M9QCbEZzD7mPCllg8yoiovZ_hhygI/s320/DSC_0464.JPG" /><br /><p></p><p>edit: between this picture and the one from Genoa, I'm starting to get an appreciation for what lousy resolution Blogger supports. You can't read it, now, but that sign reads "Beware of Poisonous Snakes." I'm pretty unhappy, overall, with how Blogger handles pictures. I suppose that's what you get with a free service...</p><p>Double edit: Maybe these work better.</p><p><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/Vg46e0lt9W5kJqNKMVgd4g?authkey=Gv1sRgCN2WlvDbi82OTQ&feat=directlink">http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/Vg46e0lt9W5kJqNKMVgd4g?authkey=Gv1sRgCN2WlvDbi82OTQ&feat=directlink</a></p><p><a href="http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/qfEb4GVcD0B4ZOpaAjCCPA?authkey=Gv1sRgCN2WlvDbi82OTQ&feat=directlink">http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/qfEb4GVcD0B4ZOpaAjCCPA?authkey=Gv1sRgCN2WlvDbi82OTQ&feat=directlink</a></p>Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12256607085558454970noreply@blogger.com0