DIVIDED WORLDS

I haven't been around for awhile. Political overload? Not really sure . We get these dry spells I guess. Anyway. Finally managed to replace my copy of Women Healing Earth. Some random thoughts half way through the intro.

The attitudes of white upper middle class and upper class feminists seem to have a disconnect with working class white women and women of color. And especially their second and third world sisters. How does our import, long distance food economy affect third world women who can not get enough food for their families because the best farmland is growing export crops? How about access too clean water because water is being diverted to grow GMO crops that need more water and fertilizer? What is the effect on families of debt taken on to grow crops with seeds that can not be saved and shared? How many of these problems fly under the radar while we share a picture of the president with paper on his shoe?

ELEMENTALS

I wrote this back in 2013. Considering the push back on the environment, and just about everything decent that has been done in the last century or so reposting this seemed appropriate.

The veils between the physical and spiritual worlds seemed thinner in the past. There was a time when it was easier to believe that there were spirits in the rocks, the trees, the streams. A vision of the world that’s still often dismissed as “Nature Worship” by mainstream society.

I don’t believe that the old Celts worshipped Nature as I understand word, but they were much more in touch with the world, seen and unseen, around them. This immersion in the spirit world seems to have persisted longest on the fringes of Europe. In Ireland, where Rome’s writ never ran. Or in the highlands and islands of Scotland beyond Hadrian’s Wall. Even the people of Wales held onto most of their independence until the thirteenth century and the invasions of England’s Edward I.

I’m not even sure that the Celtic concept of creation or creator is the same as the world view I grew up with. They certainly have enough different words to work with. And heck, maybe it doesn’t really matter unless you’re trying to learn how to speak one of these jaw breakers of a language.

The word often used in Irish for creator, Duileamh (always capitalized and pronounced dool-yev) doesn’t have the root word for create. It doesn’t have the root word for God, or the Almighty, or Supreme Being; all those words our world view equates with a supernatural Creator.

This difficult, for us, to pin down word can mean “being in the elements,” or “one who is in the elements” or “one who is the elements.” To make it even more interesting the root duil can also mean desire, hope, fondness or expectation. They’re all related, I guess, maybe…….oh heck I’ll take their word for it. Try asking Who is fond of What? Who desires What? Careful, the next thing you know you just might decide that Creator and Creation are caught in a web of desire, hope, and fondness that we aren’t used to facing in our world view of the sacred confined to a few hours on a certain day and tucked in the closet the rest of the time.

The highlanders of Scotland used to bless each other in a way that turns the way we treat each other and the world around us on its head.

“The love and affection of the moon be yours.

The love and affection of the sun be yours.

The love and affection of the stars be yours.”

And work their way through all the things of nature around them until they end with

“The love and affection of all living things be yours.”

Adapted from Yearning for the wind.

Perhaps it isn’t so strange to feel a kinship with the sun. The sun feeds the plants, the plants feed the cows and the cows feed us. I guess you could say we carry a bit of sunshine with us through the day; and the night.

If we really believed that the local river had love and affection for us we might treat it like the irreplaceable creation that it is instead of as a sewer. If we could stretch our minds around the idea that the mountains and valleys might love us perhaps we’d think twice about carving off the top of a mountain to get at the coal and dumping the tailings in the valley below. If we truly felt the living web instead of seeing board feet when we look at an old growth forest maybe we’d be more careful as we harvest the trees we need. As it stands we don’t believe we have the love and affection of our fellow human beings much less the rest of the world and the creatures in it.

The elements of creation. “The Love and Affection of the Elements. The Pure Love of the Elements. The Being of the Elements. The One Who is the Elements.” Tom Cowan notes that the participants were trying to discuss these concepts at a workshop for Celtic Shamanism. One woman in the group wished our language had words like these. Another broke in with “Wouldn’t it be great if our culture had ideas like this.” Taken from Yearning for the Wind.

Just wouldn’t it though?

THE WORLD IS NOT SO LARGE

"The world is not so large, it is quite small. There are 27 species of birds on the endangered species list which live in Hawai'i and nest in the Arctic Wildlife Refuge, and if they develop the oil in that refuge, we will not have those birds. The world is quite small . . . Because [each act] is a pebble in a pond. Small pebble  large ripple." From an interview with Hawaiian lands activist Miilani Trask.

 That was back in the nineties. Endangered birds. Endangered fish. Endangered animals. Endangered rivers. Endangered oceans. Endangered lands and underground waters. Endangered children. Endangered women. Endangered men. A screaming planet. It's all one. Little pebbles. Big, big ripples.

A SHEPHERD'S LAST PLEA

Oscar Romero was archbishop of San Salvador for three years. They thought they were getting a conservative. He was middle aged. His health wasn't that good. They thought they were getting a pussy cat. They got a tiger. For three years he defended his people. Until the last sermon.

"Brothers, you are from the same people; you kill your brother peasants...No soldier is obliged to obey an order that is contrary to the will of God. Now it is time for you to recover your consciences so that you first obey conscience rather than a sinful order...in the name of God, then, in the name of this suffering people, whose cries rise to the heavens, every day more tumultuously, I ask you, I beg, I order you in the name of Good: stop the repression."

 From the last sermon of Archbishop Oscar Romero. Preached just before Easter in March 1980. He gave this sermon knowing that he was risking his life. He was correct. He murdered a few days later. During mass. Nearly forty years later no one is quite sure who was responsible although there are plenty of suspects.

Looking at the list of possible evangelical ministers, is there even one that would make such a call to the ICE, the Border patrol, TSA, or our military today.

THE APPARATUS OF OCCUPATION

"Whether the mask is labelled Fascism, Democracy, or Dictatorship of the Proletariat, our great adversary remains the apparatus-the bureaucracy, the police, the military. Not the one facing us across the frontiers or the battlelines, which is not so much our enemy as our brothers' enemy, but the one that calls itself our protector and makes us its slaves. No matter what the circumstances, the worst betrayal will always be too subordinate ourselves to this Apparatus, and to trample underfoot, in its service, all human values in ourselves and in others."

Simone Well i in the magazine Politics in 1945. Well was a French philosopher and activist during the thirties to the fifties.

The great majority of our population lives within one hundred miles of a national border or a coastline. Especially if you throw in the Great Lakes. When will that other army of occupation, the immigration service, move from asking everyone on a bus for their papers and demand that everyone show their papers?

OCCUPIED LIVES

Jackson Brown wrote this back in the eighties at the height of US support of the wars of repression in Latin America. Well the wars are fairly quiet, but we are still living with the fall out on our borders as the survivors try to get out of the killing zones.

And it isn't much better for citizens of color in too many sections of this country. There's no blood on the wire. There's no gun ships at the borders. Although there are probably drones. 

But read the histories of occupied Europe. Learn how the peoples of Latin America under the overt dictatorships lived from day to day. Stopped for little or no reason. Asked what you are doing when you are doing it in your own neighborhood. Even in your own house. Followed on your drive home and stopped for something as immaterial as a turn signal light not working. Unarmed citizens of color shot down because an occupier with a gun "feared for his life."

In too many parts of this country police are not functioning as police. They are an army of occupation.

LIVES IN THE BALANCE

I've been waiting for something to happen
For a week or a month or a year
With the blood in the ink of the headlines
And the sound of the crowd in my ear
You might ask what it takes to remember
When you know that you've seen it before
Where a government lies to a people
And a country is drifting to war

And there's a shadow on the faces
Of the men who send the guns
To the wars that are fought in places
Where their business interest runs

On the radio talk shows and the T.V.
You hear one thing again and again
How the U.S.A. stands for freedom
And we come to the aid of a friend
But who are the ones that we call our friends--
These governments killing their own?
Or the people who finally can't take any more
And they pick up a gun or a brick or a stone
There are lives in the balance
There are people under fire
There are children at the cannons
And there is blood on the wire

There's a shadow on the faces
Of the men who fan the flames
Of the wars that are fought in places
Where we can't even say the names

They sell us the President the same way
They sell us our clothes and our cars
They sell us every thing from youth to religion
The same time they sell us our wars
I want to know who the men in the shadows are
I want to hear somebody asking them why
They can be counted on to tell us who our enemies are
But they're never the ones to fight or to die
And there are lives in the balance
There are people under fire
There are children at the cannons
And there is blood on the wire

JACKSON BROWN

POLICED OR OCCUPIED

Some of these entries  may get a little disjointed as I work my way through.

After integration became the law of the land and the voting rights act was passed came Watts. King discovered that plenty of the inner city inhabitants has never heard of him, but they had heard of Malcolm. What was left of the neighborhood was in ruins and with more than thirty dead and thousands in jail the traditional civil rights movement looked like a tragic joke.

Inner city blacks could vote. It didn't get them much. They could eat wherever they wanted. If they had the money. Schools were not legally segregated, but that didn't count for much when you lived in a defacto segregated slum. They could even go to the library. If  they could find one.

 "formal equality did not change the material conditions of black people, especially those packed in the ghettos in the North. In fact their poverty continued to get worse, partly because of the progressive displacement of unskilled labor, further eroding their sense of somebodyness. After Watts, King concluded that without economic justice, the right  to a job or income, talk about 'life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness' was nothing but a figment of one's political imagination."

 "Martin did not take long to realize that poverty was no accident but was a consequence of a calculated decision of the wielders of economic power. Using Malcolm's language, Malcolm began to speak of the ghetto as a 'system of internal colonialism'. 'The purpose of the slumslum,' he did in a speech at the Chicago Freedom Festival, 'is to confine those who have no power and perpetuate their powerlessness ... The slum is little more a domestic colony which leaves its inhabitants dominated politically, segregated and humiliated at every turn..'"

 From Martin and Malcolm & America: A Dream or a Nightmare

Wendell Berry in his essay What Are People For quoted a psychologist friend that the local police had told him that a "major occupation was to keep the permanently unemployable confined to their own part of town."

Are minorities in this country being policed or occupied? Some of these shootings look less like holding your ground and more like the  tactics  used in the Central American civil wars.

WHAT IS PEACE

Thomas Merton in New Seeds of Contemplation chapter The Root of War is Fear. Not sure about the page numbers I was working off my Kindle.

"If men really wanted peace they would sincerely ask God for it and He would give it to them. But why should He give the world a peace which it does not really desire? The peace the world pretends to desire is really no peace at all.

To some peace merely means the liberty to exploit others without fear of retaliation or interference. To others peace means the freedom to rob others without interruption. To still others out means the leisure to devour the goods of the earth without being compelled to interrupt their pleasures to feed those whom their greed is starving. And to almost everyone else peace means the absence of any physical violence that might cast a shadow over their comfort or pleasure. (a little editing in this paragraph).

Many have asked God for what they believed was peace and wondered why their prayer was not answered. They could not understand their prayer was answered. God left them with what they thought they desired, for their idea of peace was just another form of war. This is one of the consequences of the corrupt idea of a peace based on a policy of  'every man for himself' in ethics, economics, and politics. " (again a bit of editing) Merton was a great writer but there were times when never met an adjective or and adverb he didn't like.

This was written in the sixties at the height of the cold war. Merton's was a strong voice against the idea that any country could defend its people and way of life by destroying both itself and the enemy. Along with the rest of their neighbors.  I don't believe there was any plan on the part of the US or the USSR to ask the rest of the world if they wanted to be reduced to radioactive ashes or end up glowing in the dark. Or their own citizens for that matter. Left that it to the science fiction authors to imagine the days, years, centuries after.

And especially the birds, bees, fish, animals, trees, flowers.  All the other citizens of this world who know nothing about the politics of humans and end up on the  firing line anyway.

WHO IS ON THE BORDER OR IN THE CAMPS

Thomas Merton asked this question focussing on the dangers of nuclear war in the sixties. Well, we're looking at half a century or so later and where will we find Christ now? In the ruins of Central American countries fighting subversives? Subversives defined as priests, nuns, teachers, union organizers, lay church workers and death came labeled Made in the USA.

 The refugee trails through Mexico to the U.S.  border? Detention camps for children? Fill in the blanks for women and men of color caught in impossible situations because somebody with a gun was "afraid for their life." Anyplace where contaminated land or water has poisoned the crops, the fish, the animals? And what do you do when the choice is between poison and starvation?

"The Christian it's not only bound to avoid certain evils, but he is responsible for very great goods. This is often forgotten. The doctrine of the Incarnation  makes the Christian obligated at once to God and to man. If God has become man, then no Christian is ever allowed to be indifferent to man's fate. Whoever believes that  Christ is the Word made flesh  believes that every man must in some sense be regarded as Christ. For all are at least potentially members of the Mystical Christ. Who can say with absolute certainty of any other man that Christ does not live in him (or her, adult or child)."They

From "Can We Choose Peace" in Peace in the Post Christian Era page 10 by Thomas Merton.

LET AMERICA BE AMERICA AGAIN

Back in the thirties there was an outpouring of African American talent. Langston Hughes was one of these poets and writers and his work speaks as strongly now as it did eighties years or so ago. 

LET AMERICA BE AMERICA AGAIN

Let America be America again.
Let it be the dream it used to be.
Let it be the pioneer on the plain
Seeking a home where he himself is free.

(America never was America to me.)

Let America be the dream the dreamers dreamed--
Let it be that great strong land of love
Where never kings connive nor tyrants scheme
That any man be crushed by one above.

(It never was America to me.)

O, let my land be a land where Liberty
Is crowned with no false patriotic wreath,
But opportunity is real, and life is free,
Equality is in the air we breathe.

(There's never been equality for me,
Nor freedom in this "homeland of the free.")

Say, who are you that mumbles in the dark?
And who are you that draws your veil across the stars?

I am the poor white, fooled and pushed apart,
I am the Negro bearing slavery's scars.
I am the red man driven from the land,
I am the immigrant clutching the hope I seek--
And finding only the same old stupid plan
Of dog eat dog, of mighty crush the weak.

I am the young man, full of strength and hope,
Tangled in that ancient endless chain
Of profit, power, gain, of grab the land!
Of grab the gold! Of grab the ways of satisfying need!
Of work the men! Of take the pay!
Of owning everything for one's own greed!

I am the farmer, bondsman to the soil.
I am the worker sold to the machine.
I am the Negro, servant to you all.
I am the people, humble, hungry, mean--
Hungry yet today despite the dream.
Beaten yet today--O, Pioneers!
I am the man who never got ahead,
The poorest worker bartered through the years.

Yet I'm the one who dreamt our basic dream
In the Old World while still a serf of kings,
Who dreamt a dream so strong, so brave, so true,
That even yet its mighty daring sings
In every brick and stone, in every furrow turned
That's made America the land it has become.
O, I'm the man who sailed those early seas
In search of what I meant to be my home--
For I'm the one who left dark Ireland's shore,
And Poland's plain, and England's grassy lea,
And torn from Black Africa's strand I came
To build a "homeland of the free."

The free?

Who said the free? Not me?
Surely not me? The millions on relief today?
The millions shot down when we strike?
The millions who have nothing for our pay?
For all the dreams we've dreamed
And all the songs we've sung
And all the hopes we've held
And all the flags we've hung,
The millions who have nothing for our pay--
Except the dream that's almost dead today.

O, let America be America again--
The land that never has been yet--
And yet must be--the land where every man is free.
The land that's mine--the poor man's, Indian's, Negro's, ME--
Who made America,
Whose sweat and blood, whose faith and pain,
Whose hand at the foundry, whose plow in the rain,
Must bring back our mighty dream again.

Sure, call me any ugly name you choose--
The steel of freedom does not stain.
From those who live like leeches on the people's lives,
We must take back our land again,
America!

O, yes,
I say it plain,
America never was America to me,
And yet I swear this oath--
America will be!

Out of the rack and ruin of our gangster death,
The rape and rot of graft, and stealth, and lies,
We, the people, must redeem
The land, the mines, the plants, the rivers.
The mountains and the endless plain--
All, all the stretch of these great green states--
And make America again! 

Langston Hughes

You can find his work on the net and I suspect i will be visiting those poems and revisiting them. He speaks as powerfully now as he did then. 

WE DON'T WANT TO GO THERE

Yeah, it would be a different world all right. I sure as hell wouldn't want to live there as much as I dislike fundies of any stripe. The atheists can be just as militant and just as insulting. 

I have experienced immanence. Something or someone is out there. But, that is personal to me. I can't explain it and I'm not going to condemn anyone because they don't share it. But, don't condemn me or insult me because I have this personal experience or belief.

OK follow this to the logical conclusion. This is the banner picture for Hitchen's personal blog Reason over Religion. How do you prevent parents from teaching their children. How do keep parents from taking their children to religious services. And that covers everyone from Amish to pagans. Trying to actually do this would make 1984 look like Sunday afternoon tea with the vicar.

The Rights of Fish, Animals, Birds and Plants

"If this nation has a long way to go before all our people are truly created equally without regard to race, religion, or national origin, it has even farther to go before achieving anything that remotely resembles equal treatment for other creatures who called this land home before humans ever set foot upon it...while the species themselves... fish, fowl, game, and the habitat they live in-have given us unparalleled wealth, they live crippled in their ability to persist  and live in conditions of captive squalor...this enslavement and impoverishment of nature is no more tolerable or sensible than enslavement and impoverishment of other human beings...perhaps it is because we are the messengers that not only our sovereignty as Native governments but our right to identify with a deity and a history, or right to hold too a set of natural lass as practiced for thousands of years is under assault. Now more than ever, tribal people must hold onto their timeless and priceless customs and practices. Ted Strong in the introduction to All Our Relations by Winona LaDuke.

Mr. Strong is an activist with the Columbia River Tribes speaking for the rights of our non human neighbors, especially the salmon people.

TRIBAL ENTRIES

More for my own use. Planning to work my way through a book I have on Native American healing arts. Just wanted a reference I can use without having to flip back  and forth.

ABENAKI

Algonquin Indiana of the Northeast who live in Vermont, New Hampshire and southern Quebec. They were part of the Wabenaki Confederacy.

ABSAROKA

See Crow

ALABAMA

Are an early tribe in the southeast whip we members of the powerful Creek Confederacy during the colonial n period. Both na state and a river are named for them.

ALEUT

Native people's of the Aleautian island chain of about a hundred islands stretching almost 1, 200 miles between Alaska and Siberia. They are fishermen, artists and basket weavers. Who live in villages on mainland Alaska.

ALGONQUIN

Is the name of a native language group. It is also the name for a large group of tribes and bands in the eastern woodland who speak similar dialects. Some off their eastern tribes were among the earliest to meet European settlers.

ARAPAHO

Western Algonquin who lived across the Great Plains. Horsemen, warriors, medicine people, artists and traders. They now live in Oklahoma and Wyoming.

CAYUSE

Were horse breeders of northern Oregon and southeastern Washington in the Columbia Plateau. Today many live on the Umatilla reservation near Pendleton, Oregon.

CHEROKEE

Were hunters, farmers, and medicine people. Most were forced from their lands around Georgia in 1838-39 under the removal policy. The Cherokee remain one of the largest tribes today. Tribal headquarters are in Tahlequah, Oklahoma in the b West, and Cherokee, NC in the east.

CHEYENNE

Were an early farming people from the Great Lakes regions who migrated to the Great Plains. Northern Cheyenne now live on a reservation in Lame Deer, Montana. The Southern Cheyenne share trust lands with the southern Arapaho in Concho, Oklahoma.

CHICKSAW

Were a southeastern Mississippian people with close ties to the Creek and Choctaw. They were early farmers.during the early 1800's most of them were relocated west of the Mississippi into Indian territory. Today they are centered in South central Oklahoma.

CHOCTAW

Descendants of the Mound Builders, closely related to the Creek. Homeland s in the southeast, they are farmers, gathers,hunters they wee relocated the West in 1830's suffering great losses. Have reservations in Mississippi and Oklahoma.

COMANCHE

Were horsemen and buffalo hunters once called "Ord of the southern plains" because of their power and grace. They are now centered in Lawton, Oklahoma. Shady lands with the Kiowa and Apache.

CREEK

Descendants of the Temple Mound Builders, so  because their villages were located along rivers and creeks. Allied with similar tribes they formed the Creek Confederacy. Many migrated or were removed from  their homelands during the 1800's. Most are at Okmulgee in eastern Oklahoma.

CROW

Absaroka or Apsaroka "bird people,"  were early relatives of Hidatsa of the upper Missouri River regions. The Crow were buffalo hunters, scouts and gathers of the Great Plains.

DELAWARE

Or Lenni Lenape "true people" originally lived in what became New York, Delaware, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania. These tribal groups suffered early settlement pressures and moved or were moved to Canada or Oklahoma.

DINE

"People" are commonly called the Navajo. This is the biggest tribal nation in the U.S. They migrated from the north to the southwest about a thousand years ago. Horsemen, farmers, jewellers, weavers; they are also herbalists and healers.They are centered in Window Rock, Arizona and their reservation in the Four Corners region of Nevada, Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico.

ESKIMO

See Inuit or Inupiat. Closely related to the Aleuts and other groups who live in the Arctic and sub Arctic regions. Numerous villages are organized into six corporations in Alaska and Inuit in Canada have the Nunavut region in the Northwest Territories.

FLATHEAD

Were Salish who did not follow the custom of head shaping practised by others that produced a distinctive dome shape. They were fishermen and horsemen on the territory that became parts of Montana and Idaho. They b share a reservation with  the Kootenai near Dixon, Montana.

HAIDA"

"People" were a Northwest Coast tribe  lived on Queen Charlotte Island off the coast of British Columbia. Wood workers, boat builders, totem pole carvers, and fishermen. The Half a built spruce Adams cedar plank houses in which they hosted Porsches. The Haida now live in coastal villages in Canada and Alaska; many are famous for their distinctive artwork.

SCAM WARNING

For all you amazon customers out there. If you get a call from someone claiming to be with Amazon and telling you that your someone has tried to access your account from a city far, far away from where you are hang up immediately. Especially if they have extremely heavy accents. Check your account to see if there has been any activity, call Amazon and request to change your password. I got scammed and am trying to sort it out.

And if you are dumb enough to start trying to sort it out with them if it doesn't make sense do not listen if they try to tell you 'this is how we do it" 

Tried to sell me another fortunately I had my card blocked. And my password is changed. 

HAVSUPAI

"People of the Blue Green Water" are descendants of ancient farmers along the Colorado who grew corn , squash, melons, beans and rest of the American food basket in irrigated fields. Their reservation is near Supsi, Arizona near the Grand Canyon.

HAWAIIANS

are descendants of prehistoric Polynesian s and other Pacific Islanders who settled the eight tropical Hawaiian Islands. Early Hawaiians were village farmers, fishermen, artists ruled by kings and queens. Two hundred years of exploitation and settlement pressures have thinned the native populations, but they remain strong in their traditions.

HIDATSA

Were village farmers and traders who built earth lodges on bluffs overlooking the Missouri river. They are one of the Three Affiliated Tribes, sharing reservation lands with the Mandan and Arikara in North Dakota near Fort Berthold.

HOHOKAM

"Vanished Ones," were prehistoric desert farmers in the ancient Southwest . They lived in the Gila and Salt River valleys from 100 BC to about 1500 AD. Their pottery, etched shells, weaving, and earthen mounds remain as vivid reminders of a sophisticated early culture and may also reflect an association with early Mesoamerican cultures.

HOPEWELL CULTURE

Were ancient Mound Builders centered in the prehistoric Ohio, Illinois, and Mississippi River valleys more than two thousand years ago. (300 BC-700 AD). These Stone age craftspeople established widespread trading networks and left us reminders of their artistic presence.

HOPI

"Peaceful Ones," the western most Pueblo people w farm near their ancient village settlement on the mesas and in the valleys of North eastern Arizona. They are probably descendants of the Anasazi. Their kachina rites and kiva ceremonies are part of one of the oldest healing cultures in North America.

HUALAPAI

are named after the pinyon pine, which produced one of their staple foods.These Colorado  river region hunters and gatherers were noted herbalists and medicine people whose powers often came from dreams.Their tribal center today is Peach Springs,  Arizona, near the Grand Canyon.

HURON

Were clans of northern Iroquois hunters and fur traders in the Great Lakes region. They were also noted farmers who built their long houses along river plateaus. They were nearly exterminated during the Fur Trading Wars. Their descendants live in both Canada and the US.

ILLINOIS

"People" were bands of prairie Algonquin who hunted and traded across the plains. Conflicts, diseases, and westward expansion thinned their numbers. Today their descendants are settled in the northeast corner of Oklahoma.

INUIT

See Inupiat

INUPIAT

"Real People" are Arctic and sub Arctic native peoples of Alaska, often called Eskimos. Closely related to the Inuit, they are skilled hunters, fishermen, and crafts people whose villages were organised into six native  corporation s by the Alaska Native Claims Act of 1971.

IOWA

Were early farmers, horsemen, and buffalo hunters across the Missouri and Mississippi river valleys who suffered great losses from conflicts, diseases and westward expansion. Their descendants are settled on trust lands in Kansas, Nebraska and Oklahoma.

IROQUOIS

call themselves Haudenosaunee "People of the Long House," The Iroquois were farmers, warriors, statesmen, and leaders in the tribal North East. Their reservations and reserves stretch across upper New York and Southern Canada.

KIOWA

"Main people," were seasonal hunters and warriors who ranged across the Great Plains . They were and are noted leaders, artists, medicine people. They  were allies of the Apache and Comanche, with whom they farm and share trust lands and oil leases in Carmegi, Oklahoma, today.

KLAMATH

"People," were hunters and gatherers of the Oregon plateau regions . Noted resistance fighters and warriors, they suffered many losses as a result of federal policy changes, especially the termination policies of the 1950's.

KWAKIUTL

Were North East coast people living on Vancover Island. Skilled hunters, fishermen, craftsmen were known for their approaches and mystical religious societies with elaborate masks, rites and stories. They were also mask and totem pole carvers whose works expressed complex tribal traditions. Ten bands remain in BC today. The salmon are central to their economies.

MAKAH

"Cape Dweller," are rugged North West coast people living on the Olympic Penninsula of Washington statestate. They are fishermenfishermen, whalers, hunters, gatherers, weavers and carvers. Their reservation is in Neah Bay, Washington.

MANDAN

were early Plains Indians who settled along the Missouri river, anywhere they were successful farmers, gatherers, and buffalo hunters. Along with their neighbors, the Arikara and Hidatsa, they see called the three affiliated tribes. They share lands and a similar way of life at Fort Berthold, ND.

MENOMINEE

"Wild Rice People," were Great Lakes Algonquin, noted for their hunting, fishing, trading, and artistry. Centuries of settlement pressures and federal termination policies have pushed the tribe into decline they continue to work for proper restitution.

METIS

"Mixed blood" the b word is French, is a historical term usually meaning someone of Cree-French ancestry. This  stems from the seventeen hundreds when Canadian back woods trappers traded with the Cree and other tribes to supply the European demand for pelts.

MIAMI

"People of the Penninsula," were Prairie Algonquin of the southern Great Lakes region who were noted warriors , traders, and artists.They were noted warriors, traders, and artists. They were known for their calumets, (peace pipes) and war clubs. Several bands of Miami live in northeastern Oklahoma.

MICMAC

"Allies" were maritime Algonquin, allies of the Maliset and  members of the Wabenaki confederacy in the northeast. Woodland hunters, gatherers, herbalists, and fishermen, they are noted for their fone craftsmanship. They live on reserves in Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island.

MIKASUKI

are close relatives and allies of the Seminole Indians in Florida. These fishermen, hunters, herbalists, and artists maintain their traditions on their own reservation along the Tamiami Trail.

MISSISSIPPI

were ancient temple mound builders who flourished throughout the broad Mississippi River valley from about seven hundred to eleven hundred AD. Their great site at Cahokia, Illinois, covered about foot thousand acres with more than eighty five different mounds; it may have housed almost forty thousand people. Ancestors of today's Creek and other southeastern tribes, probably influenced by the Olmecs, Toltecs, Maya and Aztecs.

MISSOURI

"People with the Dugout Canoes," were probably once Woodland Indian farmers who migrated to the Great Plains and became horsemen and buffalo hunters. Intertribal warfare dispersed them and reduced their numbers during the eighteen hundred s and Minden hundred s. Today the Missouri are affiliated with the Prior, with whom they share settlements in Oklahoma.

MOGOLLON

were prehistoric southwestern farming people who cultivated the high mountain valleys between three hundred BC and about thirteen hundred AD. These early gardeners raised corn, beans, squash, cotton, sun flowers, pepper, and tobacco. They also built out houses and lives and were noted for their weaving and black on white pottery.

MOHAWK

Mohawk, "People of the Flint Country" and "Keepers of the Eastern Door" for the Iroquois League. Eastern most of the six nations they were long house village farmers, warriors, hunters, traders, and basket weavers. They are known today a "walkers of the high steel," teachers, artists, and story tellers. The Mohawk are centered on their reservations and reserves in upstate New York and Canada.

MOHEGAN

Mohegan, "Wolf People," were Eastern Woodland Algonquin who were noted for their hunting, trading, medicine,farming,and whaling. Today they continue their traditions in eastern Connecticut. They have also developed economic enterprises based on their gambling casinos.

MOJAVI

Mojavi, "Beside the Water," were desert South West people who lived along three Colorado River along with their neighbors the Yumans, Havasupais, Huslapais, and Yavapais. They farmed and hunted the fertile home lands near the Monaco Desert, and also noted warriors, weavers, artists, and pottrs. They are centered today on the reservations in Arizona, Nevada, and California, which they share with other related tribes.

MONTAGNAIS

Montagnais whose name is French for "Mountaineers," were Canadian Algonquin hunters and fishermen of the north who traveled seasonally across the vast sub Arctic regions and traded with their neighbors the Cree and Naskapi. Today they live in reserves in Northern Quebec.

MONTAUK

Montauk, "People at the High Land," were east coast Algonquin on Long Island who established a confederacy of neighboring Algonquin tribes in the 1700s. They were whalers, fishermen, farmers, and gatherers. Their descendants still live in southeastern Long Island.

MOUND BUILDERS

Mound Builders were prehistoric Indians of three distinct cultural groups who lived in Central and eastern America from about one thousand BC and about fifteen hundred AD. They were hunters, farmers, artists, and potters, they are especially well known as builders off fabulous earthen mounds and villages.

NARRAGANSET

Naragansett, "People off the Point," were eastern Algonquin hunters, gatherers, fishermen, whalers, warriors, medicine people, and traders who lived in stockaded villages in what is now Rhode Island. Settlement pressures and warfare thinned their numbers, but the Narragansett are still centered in Charlestown, Rhode Island, where their tribal headquarters, church, and long house are located.

NATCHEZ

Natchez were Temple Mound Builders who maintained well organized villages along the lower Mississippi river. Their economy was based on hunting and gathering. Early settlement pressures dispersed this powerful tribe, their descendents settled among and intermarried with other southern tribes.

NAVAJO

Navajo, who call themselves Dine, "People" are the largest tribal group in Native America. Noted warriors, herdsmen, gardeners, weavers, artists, and medicine people in the southwest, they are famous fit their intricate sand paintings and the ceremonial objects that accompany their healing chanteays. They are centered in the Four Corners region around their capital in Window Rock Arizona.

NEZ PERCE

Nez Perce, "Pierced Noses," who called themselves Nimipu, " People" were hunters, gatherers, fishermen, and horsemen of the northern plateau region around the Snake and Salmon Rivers. Settlement pressures and federal prosecution drive them off much of their homeland. Their tribal centres today are the Nez Perce Reservation near Lapwai, Idaho, and the Colville Reservation near Nespelem, Washington.

NORTHEAST WOODLAND INDIANS

Northeastern or eastern woodland Indians, are a broad cultural group who shared similar ways of life. It includes the various Iroquois and Algonquin tribes throughout the northeast. Although many were displaced, descendants off most of these tribes continue to live in their home lands.

NORTHWEST COAST INDIANS

Northwest Coast Indians are a diverse group of tribes who share a lush and narrow (150 miles across) strip of Pacific Coast terrain stretching almost two thousand miles from southern California to southern Alssks. These are the dynamic totem pole and potlatch peoples who hunted for salmon, halibut, seals, and whales. They are famed for their fantastic masks, ceremonial rituals, and artwork.

OJIBWAY

Ojibway, also known as Chippewa, are Great Lakes Algonquin who call themselves Anishinabe "First People." These noted hunters, trappers, farmers, medicine people, and healers were famous for their Grand Medicine  Society, the Midiwiwin, which continues to exert traditional healing influences in countless ways. The Online at and Chippewa are centered on their reserves in Canada and on reservations in the Great Lakes area.

OMAHA

Omaha, "Those Going Against the Current," wee a Missouri River tribe of village farmers on the Great Plains who live  in earth lodges most of the year. They are gathered today in lands in Nebraska near the Winnebago Indians, Wenger their traditions continue to flourish.

ONEIDA

Oneida, "People off the Standing," are one of the Iroquois tribes. They were successful village farmers. Hunters, and artists a week as traditional long house people. Today they hold lands in New York, Wisconsin, and Canada.

ONANDAGA

Onandaga, "People off the Hills" are also "Keepers of the Council Fire" and "Keepers of the Wampum" for  the Iroquois League in upstate New York and Canada. The Onandaga are the "faith keepers" and most central of the six tribes of the Iroquois. They are based near Bestie, New York.

O'ODHAM

O'odham, "Desert People," are also known a the Papago, " Bean People, " and the Pima, "River Dwellers," Descendents of the ancient Hohokam, the "vanished ones" of the desert, they live in the desert southeast, sharing the Salt River and Gila River Reservations with the Maricopa, and the Am Chin Reservation with the Papago.

OSAGE

Osage call themselves Children of the Middle Waters. These semi nomadic prairie Indians were once buffalo hunters and village farmers. They are centered near Pawhuska, Oklahoma today, where lol reserves and other economic resources benefit their lives.

OTO

Oto were semi nomadic, like many tribes of  the prairie and plains regions. They were closely aligned with the Winebago, Iowa, and Missouri Indians. Settlement pressure during the 1800s caused hardships and land losses for them. Today the Otto and Missouri have combined into Otto-Missouri tribe share trust lands near Pawnee, Oklahoma.

OTTAWA

Ottawa, "Traders," were Great  Lakes Algonquin and allies of the Hurons, who were part of the great fur trading networks in the 1600 and 1700's. Today their descendants live in Kansas, Michigan, and Oklahoma, but they do not have reservations or trust lands.

PAIUTE

Paiute, "Water Ute " or "People of the Rushes," we numerous bands who ranged widely across the rugged Great Basin region fishing for salmon, hunting and gathering. Their reservations today are in Arizona, California, Nevada, Oregon, and Utah.

PAPAGO

Papago, "Bean People," called themselves Tohono O'Odham, "Desert People," They lived in the Sonoran Desert near the Gulf of California. These  semi nomadic farmers and gatherers coaxed life from harsh environments. Today they still inhabit their homelands as well as three reservations in Arizona.

PASSAMAQUODDY

Passamaquoddy, "People of the Pollack" were northeastern Algonquin fishermen, farmers, hunters, and gatherers, who were once members of the Wabenaki Comfederacy. One n of b their dependable staples was pollack. They have two reservations best Calais, Maine.

PAWNEE

Pawnee, "Horns"or "Hunters," were noted farmers and village traders of the plains and prairies who were relatives of the Arikara, Caddo, and Wichita. Driven from their historic lands in Nebraska and Kansas, they are centered today in Pawnee, Oklahoma. They are noted for their hospitality, farming, at work, and dancing.

PENOBSCOT

Penobscot, "People of the Rocky Place," were northeastern Algonquin hunters, gatherers, fishermen, and medicine people of the Wabenaki Confederacy. Their reservation, centered on Indian Island near Old Town, Maine, also includes numerous other islands numerous other islands in the Penobscot River. They are known for their sports, traditional crafts, carvings, and art works.

PEQUOT

Pequot, "Destroyers" or "Fox People," were northeastern Algonquin hunters, gatherers, fishermen, warriors, and traders. This powerful tribe dominated early trading until their numbers were decimated by colonial warfare. They are based in Connecticutt, with Mashantucket tribal headquarters in Ledyard and Mashantucket, and the Paucatuck Pequot Reservation in North Stonington. Successful tribal enterprises, especially gambling have not only enriched their financial well being but have also contributed to the economy of the state and Southern New England.

PIMA

Pima, "River Dwellers," were successful hunters, gatherers, and village farmers in the desert Southwest. Considered to be the descendants of the ancient Hohokam, the Pima irrigated their broad fields and grew corn, squash, melons, beans, cotton, sunflowers and tobacco. Today they share the Salt River and Gila River Reservations with n the Maricopa Indians.

PLAINS INDIANS

Plains Indians were mounted horsemen, buffalo hunters, and tipi dwellers who ranged across the Great Plains, axon area teaching from central Canada South to Texas, and from the Mississippi River West tho three Rockies.

POMO

Pomo were village traderstraders, hunter gatherers and noted medicine people in California. They made some of the finest baskets in Indian America, an artistic tradition that continues today. The Pomo live on several reservations, the largest is in Mendocino County.

PONCA

Ponca were peaceful Prairie Indians who migrated west from southern Minnesota to Nebraska to farm and hunt buffalo. Settlement pressures, diseases, and conflicts caused many changes for these leaders, statesmen and artists. The Ponca live on allotted lands in Oklahoma and Nebraska today.

POTAWATO!

Potawatomi, "People off the Fire," were Great Lakes Algonquins who we noted hunters, gatherers, medicine people, and artists. Their history of hardships includes the migration from Indiana in 1838, which was called the Trail of  Death because sho many people died. Today various Potawatomi bands have reservations in Wisconsin, Michigan, Ontario, Kansas, and Oklahoma.

POWHATAN

Powhatan, "At the Falls" were about thirty bands of eastern Algonquin living in over two hundred villages in the region that became Virginia. They banded together into the Powhatan Confederacy during the 1500s and 1600s. Powhatan is also the name given to a powerful chief, who was the father of Pocahontis. Today some of their descendants on the Pamunkey and Mattaponi Reservations in Virginia; others now called the Rapahannock, Potomac, Nansemond, and Chickahominy, love throughout the rest.

PRAIRIE INDIANS

Prairie Indians were many different tribes who lived and hunted across the grass lands of the Missouri and Mississippi River regions. Some of these tribes lived in permanent villages with extensive farms, where they made pottery, carvings, and weavings. They also hunted buffalo, antelope, and other wild game and fish.

PUEBLO INDIANS

Pueblo Indians, "Villages," were the diverse village dwellers of the desert South West, who are today known as the Hopi, Zuni, and the nineteen New Mexico Pueblo tribes of the Rio Grande River regions. They are thought to be the descendants of the ancient Anasazi and Mogollon peoples. The unique architecture of their Arizona and New Mexico pueblos included dwellings  made of Adobe and stone in multistory, terraced villsges, often built on high plateaus or mesa tops.

QUAPAW

Quapaw, "Downstream People" were peaceful people of the lower Mississippi River valley who lived in bark covered houses inside palisaded villages. Settlement pressures and federal relocation policies forced them to move to new lands in the north east corner of Oklahoma, where mineral deposits found on their land help support contemporary tribal members.

SAC (SAUK)

Sac (Sauk), "Yellow Earth People" the village Algonquins of the Western Great Lakes and close allies of the Fox. Their seasonal ways of life were based on hunting and farming until settlement pressures and conflicts disrupted their traditional existence. Today they share small reservations and trust lands in Iowa, Kansas, and Oklahoma with the Fox.

SEMINOLE

Seminole, "Unconquered" or "Runaways" were southeastern Creeks who were driven out of their home lands in Georgia and Alabama. They settled and intermarried with other southern tribes in Florida in order to continue their hunting, farming, and village traditions. Federal settlement pressures and wars reduced their numbers and forced many of them to the wall the Trail of Tears in 1838-1839, bringing them to Indian Territory, which later became the State of Oklahoma. But many fought to remain; they now have five reservations and trust lands in Florida as well as lands in Texas and in Seminole, Oklahoma.

SENECA

Seneca, "People of the Great Hill" and "Keepers of the Western Door" for the Iroquois League, were noted farmers, hunters, statesmen, artists and medicine peoplepeople. They now have reservations in western New York near the cut off Buffalo and additional parcels off leased lands.

SHAWNEE

Shawnee, "Southerners" were groups of eastern Algonquin who ranged over considerable territory in the western Cumberland Mountains. These farmers, hunters, fishermen, and statesmen were also warriors, as settlement pressures threatened to displace them. Today they share thrust lands in Oklahoma.

SHINNECOCK

Sinnecock were noted fisherman, whalers, and farmers who were sought after for their wampum (shell beads) during the fur trading era. These Algonquin people are centered on their reservation in Southampton, New York (on the south fork of Long Island), where they continue to develop tribal enterprises.

SHOSHONE

Shoshone were diverse groups who lived , hunted, and foraged in the high, stuff Great Basin region West off the Rocky Mountains. They share reservation and land today in Idaho, Utah, Nevada and California.

SIOUX

Sioux, "Adders," call themselves Dakota, Lakota, or Nakota, which means "Allies." Four branches of this dynamic horse culture, each with distinct bands, migrated from the woodlands onto the great plains centuries ago. Despite the impact of settlement pressures and warfare, the Sioux have remained enduring leaders. They have eight reservations in South Dakota, two in North Dakota, four in Minnesota, and more on other states, as well as reserve lands in Canada.

TLINGIT

Tlinget, were numerous bands of fishermen, carvers, traders, weavers, and warriors on the Northwestern Coast; that were neighbors of the    Haida and Tsimshian. In southern Alaska, where the salmon were central to their economy. Tonight wildcards were noted for their totem poles.

TSIMSJIAN

Tsimshian, "People of the Skeena River" were Northwest Coast fishermen, carvers, and artists who gathered much of their livelihood from the Pacific Ocean. Today there are seven Tsimshian bands in western Canada as well as many who live on Annette Island, best the coast of Alaska.

TUSCARORA

Tuscarora, "People of the Hemp" were the  sixth tribe to join the Iraquois League when they migrated North from the Carolinas in the early 1700's, seeking to escape settlement pressures and other conflicts. Today they have a reservation in northeastern New York, and they have reserve lands in Canada and North Carolina.

UMATILLA

Umatilla, of the high western plateau region, were related to the Cayuses, Modocs, Wallawallas, Yakimas, and Nez Perces living in what is now northern Oregon and Southern Washington. The Umatilla Reservation, established in 1853 near Pendleton, Oregon, is shared with Cayuse and Wallawalla. These tubes sponsor dance and art pageants, a popular annual rodeo, and have built a fine new cultural center.

UTE

Ute, "People off the Sun" or "Land of the Sun," were the tribal neighbors of the Paiute and Shoshone  in the Great Basin region. These nomadic hunters and gatherers were sometimes called Digger Indians because they knew the art of gathering many wild foods and medicines from the earth. Today the are centered upon three reservations in Colorado and Utah (which takes its name  from the tribe).

WABENAKi

Wabenaki, "People Living in the Sunrise," was an Algonquin Indian confederacy during the historic period (about 1750-1850). It brought together the Abenaki, Penobscot, Passsmaquoddy, Micmac, Maliseet, and Pennacook peoples.

WALAPAI

Walapai, "Pine Tree People" see (Hualapai)

WAMPANOAG

Wampanoag, "People of the Dawn" were coastal Algonquin fishermen, farmers, and warriors in the Northeast, where they formed strong alliances during the settlement period. Displacement, conflicts, and diseases thinned their numbers and ended their lands. Today the Gay Head Wampanoags are centered on Martha's Vineyard, and the Mashpee Wampanoags are based in Mashpee, Massachusetts, on Cape Cod.

WINEBAGO

Winebago, "People of the Dark Water," were Great Lakes Algonquin fishermen and village farmers as well as noted medicine people. They have reservations in Wisconsin and Minnesota and share reservation lands with the Omaha in Nebraska.

WYANDOT

Wyandot, "Islanders or Peninsula Dwellers"(see Huron)

YAKIMA

Yakima, "Runaway," were Plateau Indians who lived along the Yakima River, a tributary of the Columbia River. These fishermen, hunters, gatherers, and weavers were also noted warriors who endured countless conflicts. Their reservation, which they share the Painted and other native peoples, is based in Topenish, Washington.

YAQUI

Yaqui, "Chief River," were farmers, fishermen, medicine people, and forgers in an area of the desert Southwest that straddled the United States-Mexico border. They suffered from countless radius, settlement conflicts, and missionary pressures. Today their descendants  live in six communities in Southern Arizona as well as in Mexico.

YAVAPAI

Yavapai, "People of the Sun," were numerous bands of nomadic people in the desert Southwest who forged for seasonal wild foods and medicines. They resisted missionary and settlement pressures but were drawn  into conflicts during the 1800s. They share reservation lands today with Apache and Mojave in western Arizona.

YUMA

Yuma "People of the River," were southwestern village farmers, and hunters who lived along the Colorado River. They banded together to prevent the Spanish and European settlements that eventually split their resistance. They share reservation lands today with the Maricopa and Cocopah in California and Arizona.

YUPIK

Yupik were Arctic people related to the Aleut, Inuit, and Inupiat. Their ancestors migrated across the Bering strait from Siberia more than ten thousand years ago. Sometimes called Eskimos, there are distinctive settlements of Yupik in Alaska, Siberia, and along the Pacific Arctic regions.

YUROK

"Downstream People," were northern California people, who fished and hunted along the Klamath River, with there neighbors the Karoks " Upstream People. " Today these tribes have several small reservations (rancherias) in Humbolt County, California.

ZUNI

"Flesh" also AiShiwi, are traditional Pueblo farmers, hunters and artists of the upper Zuni River in western New Mexico, where they originally had seven villages. They are descendants of the ancient Mogollon Culture. Noted stone cutters, carvers, silver smiths and jewelers, they are especially famous for their festival dances at Zuni Pueblo, where they host an annual fair.

ONE TIN SOLDIER

Now I wonder who the tin soldier is this time around.

Listen people to a story
That was written long ago,
'bout a kingdom on a mountain
And the valley folks below.
On the mountain was a treasure
Hidden deep beneath a stone,
And the valley people swore
They would have it for their very own.

Go ahead and hate your neighbor,
Go ahead and cheat a friend.
Do it in the name of heaven,
You can justify it in the end.
There won't be any trumpets blowing,
Come the judgement day,
On that bloody morning after,
One tin soldier rides away.

So the people of the valley
Sent a message up the hill,
Asking for the buried treasure
Tons of gold for which they'd kill.
Came the answer from the kingdom,
With our brothers we will share,
All the riches of the mountain,
All the treasure buried there.

Now the valley cried with anger,
Mount your horses draw your swords
And they killed the mountain people,
So they won their just rewards.
Now they stood before the treasure
On the mountain dark and red
Turned the stone and looked beneath it
Peace on earth was all it said. 

Go ahead and hate your neighbor,
Go ahead and cheat a friend.
Do it in the name of heaven,
You can justify it in the end.
There won't be any trumpets blowing,
Come the judgement day,
On that bloody morning after,
One tin soldier rides away.

Songwriters Brian Potter, Dennis Earle Lambert

MEMORIES

It was spring of 1968. Fifty years ago. I was a senior in a small logging town in Oregon. We had a new teacher for junior year US history. He was young. He was an army veteran and somehow, some way, he had access to archive films from the end of WW II.

I suspect his students had to get permission slips. I don't know. maybe not. Seniors who had study hall were invited, I don't remember that we needed them. After all it was 1968 and there were still plenty veterans who were still around.

The films were taken in liberated concentration camps. Bodies so starved you could not tell if they were men or women being bulldozed into mass graves. Soldiers wearing masks in hope of cutting the stench.

Survivors, if you could call them survivors, huddled together. Some in scraps of prison uniforms. I could not keep looking. I could not look away. I don't remember if there was a soundtrack. What could be said anyway? Such and such a camp? So many dead? So many so far gone they wouldn't survive? So many who would wish they hadn't survived? A few would build new lives?

I haven't remembered this in years. A plague on those who voted for Trump, on those who stayed home, those who were too pure to vote for the candidate who had chance. I'd say the hell with it but I still have a sliver of hope.

WHO ARE YOU?

An adaptation of something I wrote several years ago.

I was the song, I was the singer.

I was the earth, I was the willow.

I was the hill, I was the badger.

I was the stone, I was the moss.

I was the meadow, I was the deer.

I was the flower, I was the bee.

I was the marsh, I was the heron.

I was the river, I was the salmon.

I was the sea, I was the dolphin.

I was the sea, I was the wave.

I was the wind, I was the gull.

I was the sun, I was the mist.

I was the dream, I was the dreamer.

The line about the gulls was influenced by something we saw on on the coast several years ago. We were watching gulls flying up the beach against the wind. A few minutes later a white blur could be seen flashing in the other direction. It was the gulls. Fighting  against the wind so they could ride the wind back down the beach.

It was fun watching them.

HISTORY REPEATS ITSELF: OVER AND OVER AND OVER

Read this quote first, do not skip to the bottom. The little blank hides the identity of the subject of the passage. Source is after the quote. But does this sound dreadfully familiar?

 "In a state of constant self-suppression, for the one thing their master could not bear was for anyone to disagree with him, to have an opinion apart from his own. What he seemed to seek in his surrounding was a chorus of approval from persons who had sunk their own personalities, submerged them for the the time, while they themselves played the role of listeners. At first I rather despised this complacent courtier-like attitude, yet insensibly  I too fell into it, found myself searching for points of agreement with ......., rather than risk displeasing him by any form of polite argument. "

From George, Nicholas and Wilhelm: Three Royal Cousins. The subject was the German ruler Wilhelm II. He does sound a lot like "he who shall not be named." Wilhelm had the attention span off a gnat, hated to read anything of substance, insisted on constant approval, had trouble finishing what he started and so on. The quote is from Anne Topham, an English governess in the German court. English governesses were quite popular in several European courts.

BUT WE STILL HAD BOBBIE, THEN BOBBIE WAS GONE

Martin Luther King was murdered in April 1968. Against the advice of his staff Bob Kennedy kept a campaign stop in a black neighborhood in Indianapolis. From the back of a flat bed truck he made the announcement that King has been murdered. Over the next six minutes he made a speech that few ever knew existed. But, in a a night of rage, grief and fire their were no riots in Indianapolis.

Some folks comforted themselves that Martin was gone but we still had Bobbie. 

"It made my mother scream.

That’s what I remember. I had been lying dozy in bed, but at the sound of her, I scrambled into the living room. She was standing before the television watching an image of chaos in a hotel ballroom.

Although I grew up in the 1960s, very few of the signal events of that tumultuous decade managed to penetrate my childish, oblivious world. I have little firsthand memory of the Watts uprising, the 1968 Democratic convention, or the moon landing. But I remember the night, 50 years ago this week, when Sen. Robert F. Kennedy was shot.

I remember that scene in the ballroom. I remember a crude graphic on TV news showing where a bullet had entered his skull. I remember hearing that he had 11 children and feeling sorry for them that this had happened to their daddy.

But then, you tend to remember the things that make your mother cry.

In many ways, Bobby Kennedy was an unlikely figure for mom’s great grief, a slightly built rich man with an upper crust accent, sad eyes, a rabbity smile and that shaggy forelock he was forever sweeping off his forehead. Because he was the runt of a rough-and-tumble clan, he was always obsessed with proving his toughness. So as a Senate lawyer, as a campaign manager for his brother Jack and as attorney general, Bobby was the unwavering scourge of communists, gangsters and anyone — he famously approved the wiretap of Martin Luther King, after all — he felt threatened his brother’s political fortunes.

Then Jack was killed.

In the five years between that tragedy and his own assassination in Los Angeles while running for president, a different Robert Kennedy emerged. He’s the one my mother mourned, the one whose example haunts this fractured political moment.

He’s the one who went to Bed-Stuy, Appalachia and other broken places politicians often do not go. He’s the one who went to California to join Cesar Chavez as he ended a 25-day hunger strike. He’s the one who went to the Mississippi Delta, knelt on a dirt floor and tried to coax a listless baby whose stomach was swollen by hunger.

He let those kinds of things get to him, let them trouble, shatter and remake him. He reached out to people living on the margins, and they reached back with such fervor that his aides had to physically anchor him to keep him from being pulled out of the car when he campaigned in certain places.

It turned out the tough guy had an instinct for the underdog and a deep, moral indignation over the unfair treatment that trapped them in their hoods and hollers, barely subsisting in the shadows of plenty. He saw their humanity. This, I think, even more than his opposition to the war in Vietnam, was what drew people like my mother.

There was in that last ragged campaign of his, this sense of the possible, of the new, of fundamental, systemic change. There was this sense of a more compassionate America waiting just below the horizon. There was, in a word, hope. Or as Rep. John Lewis, then a campaign aide, consoled himself in the grim weeks after Martin Luther King was murdered in Memphis: “At least we still have Bobby.”

Then Bobby was gone.

Fifty years later, as immigrant children are taken from their parents at the U.S. border, as the rich get richer while the poor work full-time jobs for part-time pay, as hatred flows from the top of our government, hope feels like a bygone relic of an outmoded age, like blood from a wound that never healed.

That night, Mom cried for a loss greater than she could have known. She mourned a good and decent man.

We mourn a nation that might have been."

Column by Miami Herald columnist Leonard Pitts.

For me, personally, it was the next morning. I listened the primary results on my radio, then turned it off. Probably about ten minutes before history changed forever. I don't really believe in might have beens, What if King and Kennedy had survived? What would the world look like today? 

THAT MEDAL DIDN'T MEAN MUCH AFTER THE WAR

THAT MEDAL DIDN'T MEAN MUCH AFTER THE WAR

Wars give us heroes. Although sometimes we prefer dead ones to live ones. Especially if the ones who survived the hell of combat just can't quite fit in when so called peace comes. And too often, if they aren't white.

Ira Hayes was a Pima Indian. He fought on Iwo Jima. He was on Suribachi when the flag was raised He was awarded the Medal of Honor. And he died drunk, in a ditch with about two inches of water in it. Enough water to die in but not enough to raise a crop for food.

Peter LaFarge wrote it. Johnny Cash and Bob Dylan sang it.

Ira Hayes
Ira Hayes
Call him drunken Ira Hayes
He won't answer any more
Not the whiskey drinking Indian
Or the Marine who went to war.

Gather round me people
There's a story I would tell
'Bout a brave young Indian
You should remember well
From the land of the Pima Indian
A proud and noble band
Who farmed the Phoenix Valley
In Arizona land
Down the ditches a thousand years
The waters grew Ira's peoples crops
'Til the white man stole the water rights
And the sparkling waters stopped
Now Ira's folks were hungry
And their land grew crops of weeds
When war came Ira volunteered
And forgot the White Man's greed

Call him drunken Ira Hayes
He won't answer any more
Not the whiskey drinking Indian
Or the marine who went to war

There they battled up Iwo Jima hill
Two hundred and fifty men
But only twenty seven lived
To walk back down again.
And when the fight was over
And Old Glory Raised
Among the men who raised it high
Was the Indian Ira Hayes

Call him drunken Ira Hayes
He won't answer any more
That the whiskey drinking Indian
Or the marine who went to war.

Ira Hayes returned a hero
Celebrated through the land
He was wined and speeched and honored
Everybody shook his hand
But he was just a Pima Indian
No water, no home, no chance
At home nobody cared what he had done
And did the Indian dance

Call him drunken Ira Hayes
He won't answer any more
Not the whiskey drinking Indian
Or the Marine who went to war

Then Ira started drinking hard
Jail was often his home
The let him raise the flag and lower it
Like you'd throw a dog a bone
He died drunk one early morning
Alone in the land he fought to save
Two inches of water in a lonely ditch
Was a grave for Ira Hayes

Call him drunken Ira Hayes
He won't answer any more
Not the whiskey drinking Indian
Or the marine who went to war

Yeah, call him drunken Ira Hayes
But his land is just as dry
And his ghost is lying thirsty
In the ditch where Ira died.

THOUGHTS AND PRAYERS

Looks like today is a triple header. I couldn't make out the name of artist.

Courtesy of Benjamin Corey's FB page. His blog can be found under Formerly Fundie.

AFTER THE SHOOTING STOPS

It's one of these double posting days.

For years I've been a fan of shows like Law and Order (the original, not the spin offs), Blue Bloods and the original Hawaii 5-O. And this didn't hit me until yesterday.

Another mass shooting. At a school. We focus on the victims and their families. And we should. These kids are dead. We will never know how these future moms, dads, cops, doctors, lawyers and Indian Chiefs would have done for themselves, their families, our country.

The other day a has been, right wing evangelical opined that there had been doctors who could have cured cancer. Sent by God. But they had been aborted before they had the chance. Hey gun lovers! Maybe one or more of those kids could have discovered a universal cure for cancer but they were brutally murdered by a nut with access to guns, ammo, and an attitude of heaven knows what.

And, sorry for the diversion, what about the men and women who respond to these terrorist attacks? The police officers, the sheriff's deputies, the EMT's, the forensics crew, the chaplains? The ones who separate the living from the wounded and the dead. The men and women who transport the wounded to the ER. And the ER crews who find themselves caring for kids whose biggest worry that mornig was a math test. The crews who mark where the dead fell, bag the bodies and take them to the morgue. The doctors who do autopsies on kids who just might remind them of their own families. the forensics crews who bag evidence and try to find all the bullets that didn't end up on a body.

Who gathers the names and addresses of the victims? Who works through the crowd on the other side of the crime scene tape asking "do you know this person?" Cell phones that can take pictures. Or can they get ID pictures from an office staff that is probably standing there with that thousand mile stare?

AND HOW IN BLOODY HELL DO YOU CONTACT THE FAMILIES OF THE DEAD AND WOUNDED? Forgive me for shouting. Do you send officers to homes and offices. Do you call and say, what the hell do you say?

How many more bodies and nightmares will it take to pull this piece of real estate between lines on  map back to something resembling sanity? I can't call it a nation. Because is sure as hell isn't.

THOUGHTS, PRAYERS AND INACTION? NO

The chief of the Houston, Texas police department posted this on his FB page yesterday. His name is Art Acevedo,

To all my Facebook friends. Today I spent the day dealing with another mass shooting of children and a responding police officer who is clinging to life. I’m not ashamed to admit I’ve shed tears of sadness, pain and anger.

I know some have strong feelings about gun rights but I want you to know I’ve hit rock bottom and I am not interested in your views as it pertains to this issue. Please do not post anything about guns aren’t the problem and there’s little we can do. My feelings won’t be hurt if you de-friend me and I hope yours won’t be if you decide to post about your views and I de-friend you.

I have never accepted the status-quo in anything I do and I’ve never accepted defeat. And I won’t do it now. I will continue to speak up and will stand up for what my heart and my God commands me to do, and I assure you he hasn’t instructed me to believe that gun-rights are bestowed by him.

The hatred being spewed in our country and the new norms we, so-called people of faith are accepting, is as much to blame for so much of the violence in our once pragmatic Nation.

This isn’t a time for prayers, and study and Inaction, it’s a time for prayers, action and the asking of God’s forgiveness for our inaction (especially the elected officials that ran to the cameras today, acted in a solemn manner, called for prayers, and will once again do absolutely nothing).

I close by saying, I wish those that move on from this page the best. May God Bless you and keep you.

Mr. Acevedo started his career in California, was chief of the Austin, Texas PD for several years and became chief in Houston a couple of years ago. I don't know what church, if any he attends and he is Hispanic. For whatever that is worth.

BLOODY IGNORANCE

Rather than repeat the entry on the other side I'm just posting the link.  Arthritis kicking up.

TRUE THEN AND STILL TRUE NOW

Another repost from about a decade ago. Call it a blast from the past. 

This has been kicking around for awhile, but I’ve had trouble bringing all the threads together.  I’ve a got a picture. Now if I can just fit it in a frame

Harking back to my entries on canning and stuff.  It was work, but it wasn’t. There was time between batches to kick back, read a little, harass a little sister (or be harassed), pull a weed or three, to just be. That’s how I was raised. That’s what families do; or did. And that’s what they did for generations. What really bugs me is that when the work gets entered in the balance sheet for gross national product, all that ends up in the final total is the cost of the materials. There’s no line in GNP for the creation of the ties between friends and families.

The work was done within the family or with friends. Think back on all those stories of barn raisings and quilting bees. The work got done, but no money changed hands. More than likely everybody went home with tired bodies, full stomachs, the satisfaction of a job well done and enough juicy gossip to keep tongues wagging until the next get together.

No income was recorded. No taxes paid. Well, in our case, dad got paid by Pope and Talbot for managing one of their cutting crews, but that information got put on a different line on the balance sheet.

I’m sure it wasn’t some sinister conspiracy, but somehow we’ve been convinced that it’s more productive for both parents to work outside the home and pay someone else to provide the things we did for ourselves. Or try to squeeze all that “unpaid” work in around the edges.

And no, we didn’t do it all. No family could ever provide everything they needed from within the family. They always had to fill in with what they couldn’t do themselves. And no, I don’t want to live in a country where the only job for woman is in the home. I like having the choices.

But, I get the feeling it’s a giant shell game. The same work gets done. But, now the national economy recognizes the value of the work because a dollar value can be attached to it and taxes get paid. And somehow the parent that stays home is seen as being less productive than if they were in the paid job market.

And I guess you need to push to have both parents in the job market while the pressure keeps building to turn pre-school into kindergarten and kindergarten into the first grade. Can’t have those pesky children taking too much time to become employable for the jobs we’ve decided are worth paying for. There’s very little room anymore for clowns, dreamers, contemplatives or other square pegs.

I truly believe we’ve lost even more. There’s a knowledge that comes from having to manage things. You don’t learn that in a class room. There’s a knowledge that comes from knowing you won’t always get what you want the way you want it. You just might have to settle for something else. You may have to wait awhile. And you just might find out that what you get is so much more than you expected.

THE SLEEPING DRUNK

So. the current occupant has had his way and the US embassy is now located in Jerusalem. A move that all previous administrations back to Truman have avoided. Naturally the Palestinians are demonstrating and the Israeli army is shooting. I don't know what the toll in dead, dying and injured is at this point. I wrote the original post almost ten years ago. The situation has gone further down the road since then.

Oh, Thomas you were taken far too soon. And to be honest one of the few Christian writers I still read. 

A story retold by a man of deep, abiding and clear eyed faith.

A seventeenth century rabbi told this story. Two men were traveling through a forest. One sober, the other drunk. They were attacked by thieves who beat them and stole everything they had, including their clothes. When they finally reached the first village outside the forest the villagers asked them what had happened.

The drunken man (apparently still under the influence after all this time, but then this is a parable) answered first. “Everything was fine. Not a thing happened on the trip.” I suspect the villagers looked at him, each other, back to him and one of them shook himself a bit and asked the obvious question. “If nothing happened, why are you bloody, bruised and where in the name of all that’s holy are your clothes?”

The sober man broke in. “Don’t believe a word he says. There are outlaws in the forest. They attacked us. They took everything we had down to the last stitch of clothing. Be careful that what happened to us doesn’t happen to you”

Thomas Merton used this story in the preface of his collection of essays in Faith and Violence: Christian Teaching and Christian Practice published in 1967 as the country entered the worst of the violence related to the civil rights movement and the Viet Nam War protests.

The drunken man was so blind drunk that he “slept” through the whole attack and didn’t realize he was naked. (heck I’m surprised he was able to move much less walk if he was that blasted: but this is a parable).

 In his essays Merton asked this question. Can faith, religious or political, act as blinders or an anesthetic? Do we see the violence, fear and anger in others while being blind to our own? Do we keep insisting that we must be free to defend ourselves by any and all means available while denying others the right to defend themselves? “Our violence is good, your violence is unacceptable.” Does this sound depressingly familiar?

SPIRIT DANCING

By artist Barbara Kahn

“One who speaks for the tree roots and stones. Who speaks with the tree roots’ and stones’ voices. One who speaks as the grass and rivers. One who speaks as fields and woods and hills and valleys and the salt marshes and waves and tides. Yet who speaks as what is close to home. With the mouse’s voice or the seagull’s or the fox’s or the badger’s. One who speaks in cadences that go beyond the darkness and beyond stars, encompassing what is unmeasurable. One whose entire being vibrates to the spirits’ words in nature, like a reed at dawn in a pool where trout swim.

Picture a living world of tree roots, grass roots, little streams, big streams, great oceans, waters seeping into the deep rocks, recharging the headwaters of rivers and streams. The world is alive with whispers.

Wildwood mystic Rae Beth wrote of one of her familiars, an old cunning man who lived in Britain over a thousand years ago. He spoke to her of prayers. He said that we must know all the prayers of the world around us; of the birds, beasts or fish. I can understand the idea that a sparrow or a fox might pray; but the prayers of streams or stones?

What does water dream of and pray for? Does the drop of water in a tiny brook remember when it was part of a mighty ocean? Does it remember being a snowflake, a glacier, or a tiny drop of rain? Does it remember being another tiny rivulet? Flowing from rivulet, to stream, to mighty river and finally to the sea. Does it remember being caught up by the warmth of the sun only to become a new drop of rain. Does it remember the long fall from cloud to earth, the sinking into the soil, the slow drift into tree roots, the release from leaves into the air and back to clouds to fall again.

What does a stone remember? Does it remember when its atoms were part of the primal lava flows? Does it remember further back when the atoms were formed in the death throes of a super nova? Do the atoms remember their lives in a cliff face being ground down by relentless breakers? Does it remember the endless pressure as the sandstone was thrust again into daylight or carried down into the heart of the earth to return again as a lava flow?

Imagining the dreams of a bird, badger or fish is difficult enough for a human. Normally we see water, grass or stone as inanimate, unaware. To imagine their prayers; that is a mystery.