Getting off the gerbil wheel at Warm Springs Reservation

I found an old journal.  It had one entry and a poem, some thoughts of lectures.  It is the entry which is important because it is what I wrote at the very moment I made the choice to live following the original, free way of being on this land.  This is the first time I stepped out onto reservation land, Warm Springs Reservation, accompanying Hunkpapa Elder, Wilma Crowe. When I got back on the bus to return home, I returned to Indian Country in my heart and mind.

 

February 5, 1979

Wilma asked me to accompany her to a Give Away in Warm Springs.  I was reticent at first, thinking I would e stepping out of place as a Nikkei immigrant.  This Give Away by George and Janice Clements was to end the period of mourning after the death of their eldest son.  The family had not danced for a year because they were grieving. Such an important time for this family and their friends, I thought.  So private a time.  But I decided to go after much debate with myself.

 A long bus ride to Warm Springs with Wilma.  Arrived after dark, the glaring light of the lumber mill, the most obvious sight in that small town late at night  Couldn't wait until morning to see those beautiful hills whose form I admired against the night sky.  Wilma called when we got to the Standard station and George's son Warren picked us up.

 

We arrived to the Clement's home.  We walked into a house ablaze with lights, filled with people, George and Janice's adult children, foster children.  All around were hanging wing dresses, beaded necklaces, shawls.  Sixty pies spread across all the counters and table.  The welcome smell of hot coffee.  Warmer than that cup of coffee which we were both offered were the smiles of welcome from Jeanie Tom, Alta Tom, George and Janice.  Soon, Wilma and I were put to work fringing a shawl.  Alta and Jeanie and Janice beaded.  The girls rolled out pie c=shells.

 

The drum from Heart Butte would be coming soon.  They were friends and would also stay at the Clements' home, nine children, Alta, Jeanie, Wilma, the parents, the Heart Butte Drummers and a stranger, me.

 The women stayed up.  We worked on the gifts which were to be given away until 330 in the morning.  We also laughted, shared stories, and sometimes, Janice reminisced about Junior, their deceased son.  We looked over a few pictures of this young man, as a child, and as an adult, always carrying a little brother or sister, his football picture, his graduation picture, wearing his traditional outfit.   He had told his mother about the senior pictures too late to buy a suit.  His frield Amil suggested he wear his dance outfit -- Amil his close friend whom he stood in front of, protecting, when he was killed.  I looked at these pictures.  It was hard for me to understand why this healthy, good hearted young loved son was gone.

 Moments of silence passed as we beaded.  Jeannie commented about me.  "This is the one I talked about."  I had joined the beading group hosted at her home where spent the night beading comfortably, sometimes talking, often laughing and just as often in comfortable silence.  Around 330 in the morning, we crashed. I was in the living room. The big workday was tomorrow.  I dreamed that I was stringing beads and was awakened by a loud knock.  In my dream I said "Go away.  Let me finish the last few beads."  The knocking continued. It was not a dream.  I woke up with a start and staggered to the door.  There stood a man who I later learned was named Cash.  "Is George here?" he asked.  I automatically said, "he's sleeping" then I remember where I am and stepped to the side to let them in.  George came out to greet them.  The Heart Butte Drum has arrived!  Cash, Clara Jean, Bacon, Ethel, Fern and Gary.  (there should be a Snake listed here too, and Mr. Mountain Chief).

 We awakened agin at 630.  Coffee is already made.  We begin to bead and fringe shawls again.  Jeannie is working on a "Jesus" figure for the leather cover for the preacher's bible.  The night before, she had worked on a beautiful cape with two beautiful  rosettes.  The friend to receive it could not see well so they were made especially bright and large.  This man was born with disabilities and sometimes teased by the townspeople, but a relative to all. Junior had taken his name as his nickname, and for the gift, this man was to be given a cape.

 About noon, or perhaps earlier, activity picked up.  Things began to be packed out.  We felt the urgency.  Vans, cars and a pickup were loaded.  Jeanie, Wilma and I rode with Alta, Jeanne's sister in law.  Wilma sat on my lap.  We were with the turkeys, pies and corn to our ride to the longhouse in Simnasho.  As we cart the food into the kitchen I see about twenty women with scarves and wingdresses, cooking and organizing carts of food for the feast.  We get into it.  The pies must be cut.  The cabbage must be shredded.  The garbage taken out.  The turkey cut.  Thesalmon dressed and cooked.  The corn and bitter root boiled, jams, canned peaches, choke cherry canned opened and put into their serving bowls.  The frybread must be prepared and cabbage and potatos boiled.

 Outside is slippery with ice and snow.  The dogs have upset the garbage cans and ton through the  trash bags.  Right outside is stewn with paper plates, styrofoam and orange peels but all that provides safe steps across the ice as we carry in heavy boxes of apples and oranges. 

 We help out in the kitchen.  The Seven Drum, Washut Ceremony begins.  I stand in the back.  The meare drumming on had drums and singing.  Four youngwome, a young boy and a child are dancing around the circle of the Simnasho Longhouse, jumping high as they circled the large room lined with short bleachers.   I can see those beautiful hills, snow spotted through the large windows of the Longhouse.  The drums are called up and introduced.  They takeir time.  People join them to drum and sing.  There is Heart Butte Drum.

 The family is ready.  The drum begins, and  George and the youngest, Luther,  lead out.  Luther wears his eldest brother's outfit.  The men go first, and teh women next, all dance around the circle as we stand.  The designated mourners, elderly women, wail.  The family are dancing for the first time.  It is hard for me to keep myself fro crying.  Then I see the mother, beautiful in her wing dress, and my tears flow.  The dance cannot be described.  But the family bearing their grief supporting one another, dancing for the memory of their beloved son, brother, uncle and nephew.

 When the dance ends, there is a prayer and as it ends it is sent up with sound, and arm raised all of us turn in place.

 The feast begins.  Suddenly tables apear and are set up.  Our benches are to be moved so I go out into the kitchen.  More women and young girls are filling carts and pushig them.  I go outside to join Jeannie, Alta and Wilma.  Jeannie is still beading Jesus.  She tells us to go on to the feast assuring us she's almost finished.

 But first the garbage has to be taken out, I say to myself, picking up the trash.  The tribal police officer helps me.

 Wilma and Alta has saved me a seat.  As we sit, food is precisely lined up in front of us along the center of the table.  There is a pile of golden frybread too Together, everyone drinks a small glass of water to a prayer and teh feast begins.  We eat our fill.  When the meal is over, the ladies in wing dress pass out paper bags to every person, invited to take what we want as leftovers for home.  Then the feast is over.  We stand, and we pray toward the east.  This may be the moment that i began to think, "again, the circle." Along the way the stranger found a place within a circle.

 Then the drums began.  Rudy Clements, George's brother, was the spokesperson for the family.  He said, "Women, clear the tables" and the drums became louder.  We started clearing and stacking quickly.  This was so familiar to me I felt at home.  We worked faster with the drumbeat.  Suddenly everything is cleaned out, cleaned up and the tables folded and benches set back into rows.  As that ended, piles of gifts and bundles are heaped on the floor and the Giveaway begins.  Sometimes, small anecdotes came with the gifting.  The introduction of a family friend is made, and called up to receive a gift from the family.  Blankets,  beads, wing dresses, vests, shawls.  Special gifts with thought.  A lawn chair for Eight Ball so he can be comfortable at the emcee spot as pow wow.  A tricycle for Amil's little brother who provided Junior and Amil an excuse to get out of the house. 

 All the while, members of the family distribute bundles of houseware, things the family used while the son was alive.  When he had died, the ladies of the church came in to the home and took away the furniture, rugs, dishes, whatever he used and wiped down the walls.  Then day after day this neighbor, that friend, would give the family a new chair, a couch, some dishes. until the home was redone and everything new.  As for the family's things shared with their son, all of that was given throughout his friends' families.  And visitors.  Strangers.  Rudy spoke out "The ladies who are guests of George and Janice, please come up to receive a gift from the family -- Wilma, Alta and Donna." Jeanie was already family with the Clements.  I was shocked to hear my name.   I was just a rider who came along with Wilma.  This family who had already been so generous, who had fed us, housed us, and welcomed participation in the work and therefore the circle, Nikkei way, my sense of grateful obligation just kept piling up.  I was humbled as the shawls were draped across our shoulder. The generosity and the circle which accepts even the stranger into the family is a belonging I had never ever experienced or dreamed of in this country, and it changed me.  It changed my direction, my position.

 Years later in my kitchen during one George and Janice's visits to Eugene, staying with us, my mother was also visiting.  We all were washing dishes together.  Janice teased my mom.  "Mary.  You raised Donna for her first 30 years, and now we are raising her for the next 30."  It is all true.