Tag Archives: traditions

Contemplation, Family, journaling, Life, Me, Native American Women, Uncategorized

Pressing Tears

My days had been busy with work projects which for me, generally means writing lots and lots of reports.  I can easily spend six hours a day trying to keep up with all the reports that I am behind in.  This is a heavy weight on my shoulders, being behind.  When I am not working to catch up with those reports, I am making and keeping a hectic driving schedule, meeting after meeting after meeting..

My husband has been off work for about six weeks now.  He was injured while on the job and workman’s comp pay has been trickling in.  He feels guilty.  Because my main concern was that he follow his therapist instructions and get better I had not been asking him to help more around the house during this time and so many of my home chores were also getting behind.  I did not feel guilty.  I rarely do.  There is only so much a human can do in a day and if work is taking up most of my time I can forgive me for not being the perfect housewife.

But this day he had been trying to do more around the house.  He had done the dishes and was busy working on the laundry.  He then passed through the kitchen and asked if we had a spray bottle.  I was just finishing up a batch of reports and asked him why?  He said he had some shirts to iron and needed to spray them down with water.  I reminded him that our iron had spray capability, all he had to do was fill the water reservoir.  He thanked me and wandered on his way to set up the ironing board.

For the first time in weeks I felt a little guilty about not getting to all my chores and I remembered how well he did not iron shirts.  Oh he was able to get the big wrinkles out but his attention to  detail around the collar and sleeves was a bit lacking.  I smiled and announced that I had finished report writing for the day and told him that I would get his shirts done.

There were three shirts laying across the back of a chair and three hangers thrown on the bed.  I laid the first shirt out across the board and started.  The first shirt was tedious.  I was thinking “why did I say I would iron?  I hate to iron”, and I do.  It is my least favorite chore.  Those permanent press inventors are real hero’s of mine.  The second shirt began and my shoulders and stance next to the board relaxed and I started to smile.  I was remembering that this was one of the chores I learned at my mother’s side.

There are so many things that our mother’s work hard to teach us when we are young.  Sometimes those mother’s get to know if they were able to pass on all the knowledge and wisdom they accumulate to their children and sometimes they don’t get to know if they were successful.  I am not sure if my mother knew that I had mastered the collared-shirt.  It was not one of those things where she said “here, do it like this”.  No, this was one of those “osmosis” teachings.  She would iron shirts and pants for my step-dad and I would sit or stand next to her and talk.  She would talk too but she never stopped ironing.  I learned by watching.

The longer I stood there that day and the more shirts he “found” in the closet that needed to be pressed (there were five by the time I actually got done), the more I enjoyed my task.  I took the time to remember her standing there with her ironing and I learned to enjoy my ironing.  I know that my step-dad appreciated looking nice when he got dressed for work and I know that my husband really appreciates putting on a crisp looking shirt.  I smiled more and more as I turned the shirt to the angles on the board.  I took a certain amount of pride as I hung each shirt when I finished it, making sure that each collar was in proper position and that the sleeves were aligned on the hanger.

I wasn’t so much proud of me.  I was proud of what my mother accomplished as she ironed and talked and of what I learned as I talked and watched.  I was happy that she had been able to pass on so much to me, things she did everyday as mother and wife that she passed to me to use as I became mother and wife.  By the time I had finished ironing my eyes were glassy with early tears that I didn’t let fall.  He would not have understood at that moment how very close I was to my mother.  I could feel her smile as she finally knew that she did, indeed, succeed.

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Contemplation, death, Family, Life, Me, Native American Women

Rock and Roll Payday Memories

I spent the day on the road. Total miles logged was 230. When you spend that much time alone you have a tendency to think about things that normally you do have time to think about. Today I spent my time thinking about my parents. There are just certain things that trigger memories and then when I am driving I have time to let those thoughts keep running.

My mother died 3 years ago. Her passing was not easy. She was ill and she had suffered a heart attack. She lingered for two weeks in a hospital that was far from her home. She was not alone, one of her daughters and her husband were there with her. My father died several years prior to her passing. His passing was not easy. He suffered complications of diabetes after a surgery. He was not alone, two of his daughters, his sisters and several of his nieces and nephews were there when he passed.

I think of this and I am glad to have been an intimate part of that passing. I wish that I had been able to be there for my mother as well but I am glad that the same sister who stood with me while my father passed, stood by my mothers’ side as well. I can think of no greater expression of love than to be present at the passing of a loved one. To hold that hand and to say “I love you” or “thank you” or whatever is on your mind to say at that last moment.

The first thing I do is to plug in the ipod and cue up Janis Joplin. I play the entire uploaded album as loud as my factory installed speakers will allow while singing along with Janis and I smile because she was one of my mother’s favorite musicians. The I look for a convenience store, any one will do as long as they sell Payday candy bars. I buy the biggest one I can find and I eat the whole candy bar, savoring every bite and I smile because this was my dad’s favorite candy bar.

While I complete these little rituals I have established for myself I wonder about my parents. I wonder where they are? I wonder what important works they are working on these days? I wonder which of their heathen children they are watching closely today?

I hear so many people lament over the loss of a loved one that spend so much of their lives espousing their belief in a Creator and an afterlife that promises to be so much better than this life we live on this world but when push comes to shove…what they actually believe is far from what they have espoused. The absolute lack of faith explains so much to me.

For me, blaring Janis Joplin and wolfing down a Payday candy bar are the traditions that I hope I am passing down to my own daughter who someday will face these things. Someday she will think of me. I trust that she will just play the music she knows I love and eat a candy bar that was my favorite and smiles knowing that my new adventure has begun. I hope she wonders what I am up to and I trust she knows that I am having a blast.

She will then take everything that I have given her and pass those things on to her daughter and that makes me so happy. I know deep in my heart that my parents are happy about this as well, whatever they are doing today.

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Contemplation, Life, Me, Native American Women

Skeins of Life

I wish that crocheting really was relaxing. I sit down with a skein of yarn and I dream of big things…pretty things…useful things. Truth be told, I know one stitch. The “granny square”. It’s a cool stitch to be sure but there are times when I would like to crochet a different pattern.

Rather than lament about my inability I will be glad that I can work that granny square into some pretty awesome afghans given all the modern colors they can do yarn in these days.

I listen to other women talk about how relaxing it is to sit and crochet. It is not so for me. I don’t know why but I attack the yarn, crochet hook in hand, with that same attitude I attack most projects I get involved in….keep going until it is done. My shoulders are a bunched mess of muscle, my fingers ache from holding the crochet hook in one hand that the yarn in the other. My eyes burn from keeping careful watch on the number of stitches I am whipping up as I go.

I took up some old broken tile that needs to be replaced to day, I walked two miles, I cooked three meals, I folded some canvas tarps that needed to be folded (those suckers are heavy) and I did dishes that equaled the cooking I did. After all of these chores were done I could finally sit down and had a chance to relax….but nooOOOooo.

Why do I crochet then? Good question. I like the yarn. I feel the challenge calling after I have taken a skein and rolled it into a ball. Giant-ass ball of yarn staring at me, daring me to make it into something.

I think all of my kids have afghans now, probably most of my grandkids and both of my dogs. I don’t know who needs this afghan but it will be here when the new owner walks into my house. I will feel good when it is done. I will know that I met the challenge thrown out to me. I will have used my talents to the best of my ability…limited as they are. It’s a granny thing, I hear……the making of afghans.

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Life, Me, Native American Women

That Little Girl Within

Yeah, you can hang that excuse up right now. We know you too well to allow you to continue to try to use that line on us…”that little girl in me…”. Just let it go. I know that there was a time when you did not know that you were operating from some serious hurt that you carried from your childhood to today but we all know that it was more than a few years ago you saw what you were doing to yourself. More than a few years ago that you realized that the big hurt was causing you to make decisions a grown woman would not make. Instead, you were making your choices based on what that little hurt girl wanted.

Today you are making bad choices and every time we sit and talk and you start feeling like we are calling you out you run to that same excuse “the little girl in me says…”. It’s old. Let it go. The next time we have to have the same conversation (again) I might just knock you over the head with a wiffle ball bat. At the very least I will call you out and then I will make you stand. That’s right, stand, not as a little girl but as the woman you have become. She may not be the strongest person to be trying to have that same conversation with and you may not like having to stand on your own. Time to once again look into the mirror….oh I know, you hate that mirror. You hate to look and see what we all see because when you are sitting with that counsel of women who know, you cannot look into the mirror without seeing the truth of who you are.

Today begins the new year. A time, I realize, when we all sit and reflect and then think that we are going to do better, be better than we were last year. But we all also know the statistics of New Year’s day resolutions. I say, let’s just start the new year with a renewed commitment to be the women we are and then let’s move to the place where we are strongest as the year progresses.

I am filling my life with women who are strong. I am filling my life with women who understand that old hurts helped to shape us but do not define us. I am filling my life with women who I want to emulate. I would like to include you in that circle but I leave the choice up to you.

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Life, Me, Sundance

Just a Little Lost

Out of sorts, that’s what I am, out of sorts. The last two weeks I have been going non-stop and still haven’t taken a moment for myself. I know that this is the normal way of life for most people, especially if you are a parent or spouse but today I stopped, just for a minute and remembered…I remembered that I am. I let myself get all shuffled into the craziness of minute workaday details and forgot to smile, forgot to laugh, forgot to write (not really…it has weighed heavy on my mind all week but I didn’t slow down to write).

There have been so many things going through my mind, things I need to comment on and think about and poke fun at but I didn’t. So I logged off my email on purpose (just for a minute) to sit down here and see if there way anything that I just needed to say………..

The New Year is here….there are several different beginnings of a year for so many people and mine is about to start again and I am excited and happy and tired already. I have cleaned and repaired my camping equipment, washed everything I could stuff into the washing machine, painted prayer sticks and cut material for prayer flags, stripped herbs for making teas and restocked the conventional first-aid kit (you know someone will need a bandage during ten days of primative camping). I have written list after list after list of things I need and things he should not forget. I have inventoried totes and positioned them for transport.

I realized today that I have been using some of my camping totes for over 10 years (not a bad run).

There are more prayers to be made, more groceries to be bought, more cleaning and packing to be done but it is the New Year and these things cannot be put off.

I sweat lugging totes out of garage and then back into the garage, I sweat while going through each tote to ensure of its contents, I sweat because the heat index is pushing 100 degrees and then I remembered to smile.

The sweating and the sun go together at the beginning of my New Year! The celebration that begins on the first day of purification comes not without tears and sacrifice and by the end of the forth day of the dance knowledge and enormity of what has just been accomplished will be celebrated at well.

And after sitting her for a minute to remember to write this down I realize that I am not so lost afterall.

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Family, Life, Me

Surviving America

Ok, so I survived another holiday weekend. Oh I know that technically the holiday happened during the week but it was close enough that many people tacked on the weekend as well. There were numerous office populated with the dreaded skeleton crew. Some of us who ended up working while others were off playing. Yes, I was one of those who worked on Friday…but it was nice so I did not mind. On the plus side there were not nearly as many emails as I normally would have to read during the weekend.

I accidently started a family tradition years ago and now the 4th of July is my daughters very favorite holiday. I always found this highly unlikely because I do not know ANY kid who picks July over Christmas but I have come to accept over the years that she really does like the 4th of July more than Christmas!

When my baby was young I started taking her to fireworks displays in town, the big ones. We had two big displays in Fort Wayne each year. The first was at the traditional end of the Three Rivers Festival and, of course, the 4th of July show. She named each of the fireworks big booms by the sounds that accompanied the flashes. I was not a fan of the backyard do-it-yourself shows put on by the dads and granddads. Oh not that they were not fun for the kids (and yes, that is supposed to be the target audience) but it was not so much fun for me.

These shows became such a thrill for my daughter that even after her father and I were no longer married she still insisted on going and by then it had become his tradition as well. I liked that for her. Some years we would meet up during the show and some years it was my turn to take her. She was just happy to be out and looking up into the night sky those hot summer nights.

Over the years I have found myself sitting on some grassy knoll waiting for the sun to set and the show to begin. I have noticed that, over all, the fireworks have not changed so much. Probably safer for the pyro techs and computers have made some of the shows interesting with music blaring along with each big bang but essentially, they are unchanged and I think that this is one of things I like the best.

These days I am heading out to find “my spot” alone. My husband does not find the excitement that I find in a good old firework show. But I am never lonely. I chat with my camped out neighbors and we share snacks and drinks from time to time. I meet new people who have also found what a nice spot we have all discovered. There are always the new people in town who did not realize that our little town offers such a great show.

This year I sat with my girlfriend and her son as well as several other friends. She is an Ojibwa woman. We were quite the sight, two full-blooded Native women sitting in the grass in our camping chairs eating snacks and drinking pop waiting on a celebration we aren’t so sure about but we like the fireworks. We laugh at the irony and we clap at the really cool displays. Her son heads out to scout the crowd and see who is around, not that he knows anyone, he is one of those guys who finds a new friend everywhere he goes. He comes back exited that he found a Di’ne woman sitting on the hill. We are three now. Native women who sit in the crowd celebrating the birth of America, who would have thought?

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