Hanh mitakuyapi / Hello my relatives. I trust this finds you all well & happy, or getting there.
I just figured out now how to do this, or you'd have heard from me before. Not that that's a big deal, but it is 'so'.
Recently, I was cleaning in one of the local public schools, (n in Bismarck) as a temp or contract worker. Such work is way below my skills level, but it's suitably humble & it fills in blanks in the "bills paid" column of my life from time to time.
I nearly always wear a hat with 4 Channunpa on it, partly because it is my spirituality & I'm proud of it; partly because I Sun Dance, & am proud of that' & partly to remind people that not all of us have knuckled under to the whiteman's ways, but still follow our authentic Traditional Ways. That we Indns have no "acculturated" or "assimilated" & we are still here & so are our cultures. The Channunpa are central to our cultures up here on the Northern Plains, after all.
Someone in official-dumb asked me to remove my hat & not wear it, on the grounds that "it makes some people uncomfortable". Well, hooo-eeee, ain't that a sad thing; that reminders of the Holy Pipe make "some people uncomfortable". I asked who & was told I didn't need to know. ( ! )
My expectation is, it's some of the considerable over-supply we have around here of "born-agains" who call themselves part of the majority culture's supposed religious way. You know - the one where they're forever trying to stuff those 10 "commandments" they don't keep, down our throats.. Well, hey, takoszja, I'm a born-again, too! A born-again Pagan, through the Sun Dance, & way proud of it. It takes a lot of hard work & courage & determination to Sun Dance successfully. We earn our rightful pride about it.. the humble kind. But that does not mean we should hide it! Not hardly. All those who wander lost & in misery need to be reminded that some are keeping these Ways, & so be encouraged to do so, too.
Therefore, I refused, on the grounds of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the EEOA, and the Constitution & Bill of Rights - specifically the First Amendment, the sections about religious freedom & freedom of expression. This person complained to my supervisors at the temp agency, who actually asked if the hat & the Pipe & making this essentially silent statement are all that important!
Yes, they are. How many millions of us died for the Sun Dance & other Sacred Ceremonies, doing them in secret & getting hauled to prisons & mental institutions for it? It happened to me, in 1994. That's not particularly long a go. So - Yes, they most certainly are.
I complained to the School Board, the local Human Relations Commission, & the mayor about this. So far, everyone is ducking & trying not to address the "issue". Denying hard & hearty that there was - or is - any discrimination or bigotry involved.. One has even said, "You misunderstood.." HAH!
Considering that the Bismarck Public School system "prefers I not work in the schools" (& the temp agency is knuckling under to them on this), I most certainly have hit the nail squarely on the thumb.
I'm a grandmother, takoszja - I most surely do "understand". I did then, I do now, & I will into the future. I've walked the earth awhile, but I'm nowhere near senile. And they know it; which apparently scares them pea-green or they wouldn't make such an issue of it.
The truth being the most powerful weapon there is to deal with reigns of terror & general bigotry, and the Internet being such a terrific tool for spreading the truth about such things, I write it down here for you so you will know about it. Perhaps some of you will want to do something about it. After all, if you don't speak up, you can't be heard!
Mitakuye oiasin. All, my relatives.
Friday, October 30, 2009
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
Why We Beat Our Heads on Walls
Hanh mitakuyapi / hello my relatives.
I've made so many job applications since March 7 I finally started listing "job applicant" as my current job. I've heard the dumbest collection of excuses for not hiring me, & I get no unemployment & I don't want welfare! Excuses include: you know too much; you have too much experience; you were in business, we can't hire you; you have a limp.
Lessee - the Army advertises "be all you can be". Hm. Must be just a slogan, not real encouragement.. After over 30 years of work, I should have lots of experience! I do - at a high level, too. I've never been a slacker. I wanted to retire & just work a job, but apparently it's not an option, although I can't figure out how to get back in business, since I am currently down to less than $50 total money.. & temp services aren't doing anything either. As for the limp - who's hiring gymnasts these days, anyway? (Not to mention, it's illegal to focus on the limp.. but this is ND - land of bigotry of every kind & accompanying denial lockstep..)
You know why we bang our heads on walls? Because it feels so0o good when we quit! That's my rant for the day.. Thanks for listening.
Your thoughts are still welcome. Anyone interested in beautiful custom handmade moose or buffalo leather mocassins, let me know.
I've made so many job applications since March 7 I finally started listing "job applicant" as my current job. I've heard the dumbest collection of excuses for not hiring me, & I get no unemployment & I don't want welfare! Excuses include: you know too much; you have too much experience; you were in business, we can't hire you; you have a limp.
Lessee - the Army advertises "be all you can be". Hm. Must be just a slogan, not real encouragement.. After over 30 years of work, I should have lots of experience! I do - at a high level, too. I've never been a slacker. I wanted to retire & just work a job, but apparently it's not an option, although I can't figure out how to get back in business, since I am currently down to less than $50 total money.. & temp services aren't doing anything either. As for the limp - who's hiring gymnasts these days, anyway? (Not to mention, it's illegal to focus on the limp.. but this is ND - land of bigotry of every kind & accompanying denial lockstep..)
You know why we bang our heads on walls? Because it feels so0o good when we quit! That's my rant for the day.. Thanks for listening.
Your thoughts are still welcome. Anyone interested in beautiful custom handmade moose or buffalo leather mocassins, let me know.
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
No Global Warming in ND This Year
Hanh mitauyapi / Hello my relatives. It's October 20 & the temperatures are once again 15 - 20 degrees F below average for this time of year. And it's wet. We need some warm n sunny & dry-er!
An elderly noted the other day that this year we only had 2 months with no snow somewhere in ND! June 5, Dickinson had over 2 inches of snow - that's 90 miles west of my camp.. and then that area got skunked again October 6th with about 5 inches! Duwahleh! Not fun!
In between, "summer" was mostly more like spring or early fall for temps; & when I read the corn leaves this year, it said last winter was not the only ugly winter in the current time - this one would be cold & wet again.
Friends of mine got their Bi-D (bi-directional tractor - a huge 8-tired 4WD monster) stuck a couple of times last winter, striving to keep their in-drive open! NO FUN!
I'm a fair-weather Indn & no apology! Besides, I have a raft of scars & they don't like this weather either. For those who don't know - scars try to contract from the time they first form until you go to the spirit world, & like many other things, wet weather makes them try harder. OUCH!
Someone from official-dumb said on the news recently that the economy isn't all that bad up here. Mitakuyapi - he lied. Or he's got a lot more mazaska / PteDhoWakan/money than sense, because this Indn has skinned by - more like bumped & dragged by - on maybe $7500 for the whole year to date. It has not been fun; it has been hairy & scary even for one who - like all 'eagle' people - lives dancing on the edge of the abyss. Worse, I'm hardly alone. News says ND leads the nation in # of families where both adults hold 2 or more jobs. : 8 0 !! Since that's more like 'the norm' up here than not, & it's nothing to be proud of, this Indn sez things are economically, spiritually, & emotionally rugged up here -- again. Or maybe that's "still".
If you're into praying, thank you for including me & all the others in this leaky canoe. "W" & his goons put us here, & now socialists seem determined to sink us. I keep hunting for that "happy medium", & I can't find it's scat or footprints, let alone evidence of its existence..
Thanks for the towel. Mitakuye oiasin / All, my relatives.
An elderly noted the other day that this year we only had 2 months with no snow somewhere in ND! June 5, Dickinson had over 2 inches of snow - that's 90 miles west of my camp.. and then that area got skunked again October 6th with about 5 inches! Duwahleh! Not fun!
In between, "summer" was mostly more like spring or early fall for temps; & when I read the corn leaves this year, it said last winter was not the only ugly winter in the current time - this one would be cold & wet again.
Friends of mine got their Bi-D (bi-directional tractor - a huge 8-tired 4WD monster) stuck a couple of times last winter, striving to keep their in-drive open! NO FUN!
I'm a fair-weather Indn & no apology! Besides, I have a raft of scars & they don't like this weather either. For those who don't know - scars try to contract from the time they first form until you go to the spirit world, & like many other things, wet weather makes them try harder. OUCH!
Someone from official-dumb said on the news recently that the economy isn't all that bad up here. Mitakuyapi - he lied. Or he's got a lot more mazaska / PteDhoWakan/money than sense, because this Indn has skinned by - more like bumped & dragged by - on maybe $7500 for the whole year to date. It has not been fun; it has been hairy & scary even for one who - like all 'eagle' people - lives dancing on the edge of the abyss. Worse, I'm hardly alone. News says ND leads the nation in # of families where both adults hold 2 or more jobs. : 8 0 !! Since that's more like 'the norm' up here than not, & it's nothing to be proud of, this Indn sez things are economically, spiritually, & emotionally rugged up here -- again. Or maybe that's "still".
If you're into praying, thank you for including me & all the others in this leaky canoe. "W" & his goons put us here, & now socialists seem determined to sink us. I keep hunting for that "happy medium", & I can't find it's scat or footprints, let alone evidence of its existence..
Thanks for the towel. Mitakuye oiasin / All, my relatives.
Monday, October 12, 2009
My Favorite Holiday Approaches
Hanh mitakuyapi / hello my relatives. I am no fan of cold & even less of cold &/or snow &/or ice. But fall is when Hallowe'en comes, & it is my favorite holiday.
Pumpkin ghouls, wild carvings, and dressing up as "something Other".. fun stuff. But then, I am one of those women who speaks with the spirits, so in our Indn Way, I guess I should enjoy this holiday.
Last year, I carved a Hubbard squash into a buffalo & made horns from cow horn caps - lit it all with LED lights. Oooh! I carved holes so the light could go up into the horn caps & they glowed at night. Yeah!
I carved another squash into a dragon's head. Very cool, yes? I think so..
And I carved a cannibal pumpkin eating a smaller pumpkin. (Big grin).
I set them on chairs out by the road.. and attracted some of The Lunatic Fringe. The best/worst was the woman who zoomed in off the road screaming that we "worship devils" & the carvings prove it.
Duwahleh! This is supposed to be the Age of Enlightenment, but apparently it hasn't registered on everyone yet; particularly the "jesus freaks".
I don't generally say "born agains" because as a Sun Dancer, I am a born-again, too. Just very, very Pagan.
Hallowe'en isn't an Indn event - it's one of the few good things imported from Europe. But it's definitely the most fun.
Pumpkin ghouls, wild carvings, and dressing up as "something Other".. fun stuff. But then, I am one of those women who speaks with the spirits, so in our Indn Way, I guess I should enjoy this holiday.
Last year, I carved a Hubbard squash into a buffalo & made horns from cow horn caps - lit it all with LED lights. Oooh! I carved holes so the light could go up into the horn caps & they glowed at night. Yeah!
I carved another squash into a dragon's head. Very cool, yes? I think so..
And I carved a cannibal pumpkin eating a smaller pumpkin. (Big grin).
I set them on chairs out by the road.. and attracted some of The Lunatic Fringe. The best/worst was the woman who zoomed in off the road screaming that we "worship devils" & the carvings prove it.
Duwahleh! This is supposed to be the Age of Enlightenment, but apparently it hasn't registered on everyone yet; particularly the "jesus freaks".
I don't generally say "born agains" because as a Sun Dancer, I am a born-again, too. Just very, very Pagan.
Hallowe'en isn't an Indn event - it's one of the few good things imported from Europe. But it's definitely the most fun.
Cretinous Columbus Nothin' to Celebrate
Hanh mitakuyapi / Hello my relatives.
Today is October 12 & there's nothing to celebrate or commemorate about it in this Turtle Island insofar as Cretinous Columbus goes - yet on Prairie Public radio & in the Morton-Mandan Public Library, there are references to this as a day to commemorate this slime.
Let's get this straight - this cretinous creep lopped off Indn men's hands for not bringing him "enough" gold - just what is "enough" gold, anyway? - and he made sex slaves of Indn men, women, & children. Certainly there is nothing to celebrate or commemorate in either instance. We don't commemorate Hitler or Mengele.. and Indns' holocaust is still going on!
As for "discovering" this land - he didn't do that,either. We Indns were here for something like 60,000 years before any Europeans made landfall here, claims by "scientists" (who can definitely be bigoted, as we all know from reading history) to the contrary. Trust me - we were well aware of where we were - and where our neighbors were, too, along with whether or not they were friendly or enemy.
Dakota Territory is some of the most racist part of "America" yet South Dakota was the first of the 50 states to make a Native American Day, sometime in the 1990s. And in 2001 or so, North Dakota followed suit, with First Nations Day - to be celebrated the second weekend in October.
For those of you who might want to correct me with the term "Native Americans" - I'm not one of those, either, & neither are the rest of us, because this is not "America". That's a term tagged on this land by a self-promoting Italian mapmaker, Amerigo Vespucci, who wanted to immortalize himself.
This is Turtle Island, & we are properly (as a group, anyway) Indigenous Turtle Islanders or ITI for short.
We're supposed to be in the Age of Enlightenment, yet these stupid backward "commemorations" continue, & when someone (usually me) raises a stink about it, the yeowls of denial are nearlydeafening. Pitiful! As if denial made any difference. HAH!
It's long past Time to get rid of "commemorations" of monsters - other than Halloween. But then, that - in part - is what Halloween is for. The rest of the year isn't. Mitakuyapi oiasin / All, my relatives.
Today is October 12 & there's nothing to celebrate or commemorate about it in this Turtle Island insofar as Cretinous Columbus goes - yet on Prairie Public radio & in the Morton-Mandan Public Library, there are references to this as a day to commemorate this slime.
Let's get this straight - this cretinous creep lopped off Indn men's hands for not bringing him "enough" gold - just what is "enough" gold, anyway? - and he made sex slaves of Indn men, women, & children. Certainly there is nothing to celebrate or commemorate in either instance. We don't commemorate Hitler or Mengele.. and Indns' holocaust is still going on!
As for "discovering" this land - he didn't do that,either. We Indns were here for something like 60,000 years before any Europeans made landfall here, claims by "scientists" (who can definitely be bigoted, as we all know from reading history) to the contrary. Trust me - we were well aware of where we were - and where our neighbors were, too, along with whether or not they were friendly or enemy.
Dakota Territory is some of the most racist part of "America" yet South Dakota was the first of the 50 states to make a Native American Day, sometime in the 1990s. And in 2001 or so, North Dakota followed suit, with First Nations Day - to be celebrated the second weekend in October.
For those of you who might want to correct me with the term "Native Americans" - I'm not one of those, either, & neither are the rest of us, because this is not "America". That's a term tagged on this land by a self-promoting Italian mapmaker, Amerigo Vespucci, who wanted to immortalize himself.
This is Turtle Island, & we are properly (as a group, anyway) Indigenous Turtle Islanders or ITI for short.
We're supposed to be in the Age of Enlightenment, yet these stupid backward "commemorations" continue, & when someone (usually me) raises a stink about it, the yeowls of denial are nearlydeafening. Pitiful! As if denial made any difference. HAH!
It's long past Time to get rid of "commemorations" of monsters - other than Halloween. But then, that - in part - is what Halloween is for. The rest of the year isn't. Mitakuyapi oiasin / All, my relatives.
Friday, October 2, 2009
ND Higher Ed Board Lies Again
In this morning's headlines is a story that the ND Higher Ed Board has again extended their "deadline" for getting rid of the "Fighting Sioux" logo. These people have given so many excuses as to their reasons for repeatedly extending the "deadline", we can no longer count them.
Recently someone asked me why I am so adamantly against this logo. (1) We are not the "Sioux"; we are the D/L/Nakota. Not the "treacherous, untrustworthy people" - that's the ND Board of Higher Education. We are "the Allies". (2) The Oxford Standard Dictionary of the English Language - the dictionary used everywhere in the English-speaking world to define words at the highest level - gives "pet" & "caricature" as the 2 lead definitions of "mascot". Living people are neither. The Vikings are dead; we are not. Neither are our cultures. Make pets & caricatures of dead cultures if you will, but not of ours, which are still living. (3) We Indns get no benefits from this mascot. We get no payments. We get no classes or anything having the logo on it free of charge. Nothing. But the U of ND gets millions of dollars. While we Indns are forced onto welfare or ultra-low-wage jobs. (4) Many of us are against this entire situation. We never gave our permission to be logo-ed. And just because someone else did it 40-50 years ago, when the vast majority of Indns lived in fear of their lives, let alone jobs or such, if they did not accept the proposal to become 'mascots', especially means it is unacceptable now.
So - get rid of the logo now, & stop meddling in our cultures again! Hechetu chto!
Recently someone asked me why I am so adamantly against this logo. (1) We are not the "Sioux"; we are the D/L/Nakota. Not the "treacherous, untrustworthy people" - that's the ND Board of Higher Education. We are "the Allies". (2) The Oxford Standard Dictionary of the English Language - the dictionary used everywhere in the English-speaking world to define words at the highest level - gives "pet" & "caricature" as the 2 lead definitions of "mascot". Living people are neither. The Vikings are dead; we are not. Neither are our cultures. Make pets & caricatures of dead cultures if you will, but not of ours, which are still living. (3) We Indns get no benefits from this mascot. We get no payments. We get no classes or anything having the logo on it free of charge. Nothing. But the U of ND gets millions of dollars. While we Indns are forced onto welfare or ultra-low-wage jobs. (4) Many of us are against this entire situation. We never gave our permission to be logo-ed. And just because someone else did it 40-50 years ago, when the vast majority of Indns lived in fear of their lives, let alone jobs or such, if they did not accept the proposal to become 'mascots', especially means it is unacceptable now.
So - get rid of the logo now, & stop meddling in our cultures again! Hechetu chto!
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