Reznjun

we got a new female heeler pup this weekend. she is half red and half blue heeler. the previous owner already had her wormed and gave the first shots to her. i have wanted a companion for konugish since we lost our other older dog, the dog with no name. we had that dog for over 10 years. dont even know how old that dog was. konugish is the first red heeler i have ever been around. i have grown to really like him. heelers are real smart and loyal. they are a  good breed. this little pup is only two months old. i hope to keep her for a long time. who knows maybe i will even get some pups from her someday.

when i checked snail mail today i found a note from one of my bros in it. i couldnt wait to open the letter up. that made my day. i havent heard from my bro in awhile. i always wonder about my friends that are around the country. hard to keep up with everyone. many of the friends i have made over the years are mobile people. they can be here one day and somewhere else tomorrow. nice to hear from them. friends are for life.

i heard from another friend thru the net. he is living in europe. we went to college together. some of us older students would meet at the student union to drink coffee and trade sick jokes.  i still am amazed by modern technology. it allows you to communciate with someone that is located somewhere else. my grand daughter  texts  me regularly. she will tell me goodnite and or good morning. i always tell her i love her. i like that ability to reach out to her or anyone just whenever.

i am still walking my 2 miles. it is getting cooler for walking but is still doable. cant make excuses. i  am on track to meet my goal of 365 miles for the year. i shoot for a mile a day over the course of a year. some years i have met that and then some. its just a number to shoot for. the good news is i havent smoked any cigars since fall dance. its not that i got resolve, i had the flu. havent smoked cuz of that. so as they say, something good will come from everything.

holiday this week. we are having a big family dinner. i am glad my sons will be home. i need help to drag the sheetrock down the stairs to the basement. holidays are great time to get together with friends and family. i just hope i dont gain any weight. i think of some friends i had over the years. their beliefs were that they would fast that day of feasting. i remember them every year. gotta admire people that make sacrifices. i remember the times that i have gone hungry too. those days seem so long ago, but i never forget them. i believe thanksgiving is all the time, not just one day. hope all have a great holiday.

went to the rez volleyball league  last nite at the boys and girls club. i have a son and daughter playing and many nieces and nephews. it was fun watching the games. we have some real good volleyball players around the rez. i was visiting as well as watching the games. seems like the thing to do on wednesday nite. i think it is a good idea the league exists. i went to the rez softball league this past fall. now they are doing volleyball. the facilities are great. i remember back when the old gym floor needed work. i played basketball on it in my younger day. now it is in great shape. its nice they are using the gym for activities like this. they even have a concession stand to raise money for various causes.

they had a tournament over the past weekend that i missed. wish i had made it now.  while at the boys and girls club i bought some raffle tickets. they are having a 42″ flat screen tv for the prize. the tickets are a buck apiece or 6 for 5 dollah. not a bad deal if you are lucky enough to win that tv.  could watch the jayhawks win the championship on that set. its a way to  be supporting our young folks.

i have been doing demo work on my basement. before i had the new gutters put on and a new sump pump installed i had drainage problems in my basement. it flooded a coupla times, as a result the basement developed mold from the floor up. so i am tearing out the old sheetrock and replacing it.

when i first moved into this house bout 24 years ago it had  an open undivided basement. i added six rooms to it over the years.  at the time sheetrock cost about 2 bucks a sheet. its has more than tripled in price since. good thing i sold a piece of artwork. that is paying for the rock. i spent the last few days removing the old sheetrock. and i am making changes to the layout somewhat. i will add a closet to the laundry room for soap, bleach and other supplies. i moved the door to the office/libray room to make it more accessible. i will raise the platform that the washer and dryer sit on. that will hedge my bets against any future flooding. when the electricity goes out the sump pump is useless. that happened once. i lost my washer,dryer and water heater. they are all on raised platforms now.

my sons will be home to help when i  have it all ready for the rock to be hung. no way i can lug the 4′x 8′ sheets down the stairs by myself. i dont remember how i did it the first time. i am jamming while i am working in the basements. mary bought an old record player at a garage sale this summer. so i broke out some of my old albums. i have over a thousand of them. never could part with them so i just held onto them. now i am listening to some old blues, stones, beatles, van morrison and others. i like to have music going in the back ground when i work. will hear many alblums before i am done. there is still lotsa work to do….

woke up this morning to see the first snow of the season. that brought back a few memories. i remember being told to wash my face in the first snow. that was so we wouldnt get sick as much that winter. i still do this if i can remember. this morning it wake me up. the first snow also means that now we can go rabbit hunting. thing is you dont see as many rabbits as we used to. i couldnt wait for the first snow when i was young so i could hunt rabbits.  i would walk all day. sometimes i would get some rabbits, other times not.  we would hang them up for a few days after we cleaned them to improve the taste. i wonder where the rabbits are that used to bother my garden. they are long gone now.

i cleaned out my chimney for the upcoming wood burning season. i already had a fire going. the stove started smoking a few times. so i knew it was time to clean the pipes out. i do that at least 4-5 times a year. i replace the stove pipes regularly. nothing beats the heat of a woodstove.

i bought some sheetrock for my winter project. i have to replace the lower parts of some walls in the basement. they developed mold. the tops are okay, so i will just cut the bottoms off and re-rock it. gotta do demo work first. i have some floor to ceiling shelving units in a couple of rooms. i made them out of pine boards. i hope i can remove them without damaging the boards. the cost of them went up since i put them in years ago. no house has enough storage space. i dont know how long this  will take me, but my boys will be home from school to help when they can. they will help hang the rock. then there is taping, sanding and painting. at least i can have a fire going to keep warm.

my sons will be home with thanksgiving coming up and the semester will be over next month. we already bought a turkey for thanksgiving. some older lady at the store said to wait cuz the price of turkeys will drop just before thanksgiving. i said it seems like it would be the opposite with the demand going up. she said no. i didnt want to wait so got it now to save a trip next week. i will watch the prices to see if she was right.

i watched k u’s football game saturday. i was hoping for a win. i figured they were due. i watch all game only to be disappointed at the end. i am still a fan no matter what they do. football was just something to do until basketball season started. this year we should have a great basketball team. i seen them play. i will follow them all the way. hopefully another national championship.

been busy helping at a funeral. that takes 3 days and we didnt have much help. i did get to go on another ‘take a hike’ sponsored by the diabetes prevention program. i believe in exercise. i know my arthritis is easier to live with if i am walking. if i dont exercise then i have problems.  we met again at the boys and girls club. we then drove to the northwest part of the rez. there are some big hills to climb. the young ones had no trouble going up the steep grades. the older ones just went a little slower. we seen a deer running along the creek when we were on the first big hill. later someone mentioned they seen an eagle flying overhead. i missed it. before we stopped for lunch  someone said there it is again. we all looked up and could clearly see the white head and white tail of the eagle. there was no doubt it was a bald eagle. we just watched it soar for awhile. we notice more eagles around here during the winter. we then continued on our hike after watching the eagle.

we ate on top of a big hill that overlooked the surrounding countryside. it was a great view of big soldier valley. long ago many of our tribesman settled on either the big or little soldier creeks. after we all passed our food around we rested awhile. the hills were steep climbs. i walk alot but could still feel the burn in my legs as i went up the hills. we then followed the creek back to our cars. it was another great outing. there will be a winter hike next month. it was suggested everyone bring something to add to a soup. that should be good.

i went to see the movie ‘the only good indian’ in lawrence. i know some people that were in the show. i heard it was about indian boarding school. i went to see the movie with several people that were went to boarding school. we were curious how they would treat the subject. it wasnt a bad movie. i enjoyed it. we were standing around outside the theater after the movie was over. some guy asked us how we like it. i said it was a good movie. but i thought it was more about boarding school. the guy said he worked on the movie and wondered why no one wants to pick it up for distribution. he said it did well at the sundance film festival. i said its just like that. i probably will order a copy of the dvd from the website.

i dont see any accounts of boarding school that are from the first person perspective. maybe because survivors dont want to relive that experience. or maybe it was just one small part of their lives. who knows. i read what other people thought it was like but i dont think they really got the point. you had to have been there i think.

someone dropped a suksi. i got the hide. i will have to work on that this week. i already scraped the flesh side. now i have to dehair it. will save it as raw hide for some hand drums. i got some of the meat and made jerky out of it. saved some meat for stew this winter. i remember an old guy around here used to save that wild game was the best. he ate it when he got sick. others say our diets are the reason for some of our problems. we have to try to eat our natural diet. that is a hard thing to do. not possible in all situations. can only try to do it.

the guy that rents this land added lime to the field. he had plenty left over so he put a couple of loads by my garden spot. i will add it to the soil.  i tried to burn the garden spot off but the grass is still damp. then i have to pull the cornstalks. still work to do so it will be ready by next spring. oh well..always have something to keep me busy.

i went to k u’s first basketball home game last night with mary and our kids. we sat next to my nephew tug and his wife kristen. we created an injun section.  it is always fun to go to allen field house. the place was packed and rockin like it always is. you cant beat the atmosphere there.

 the outcome of the game was never in doubt. the hawks are one of the best teams in the nation. i think they will be the very best team, they are loaded with talent. the opponent was a small school. they are very good in their league but just didnt have the athletes the jayhawks have. when the game was winding down we headed down to high five the players. i do that everytime i go to a game. it has become of ritual of mine. i missed some of the players but touched hands with some of the best players. i want to go to another game now.

i dont think you should mess with this team. the football team tried to fight them and havent won a game since then.

my grand daughter added me on facebook. i keep in touch with her by texting also. it makes my day to hear from her. sometimes she will text me good night and say i love you. that makes me feel good. sure love that girl.

tonight we will go watch the rez volleyball league held at the boys and girls club. a couple of my kids play in that league. they used to play here every summer. we would have alot of teenagers here playing volleyball in the yard. sometimes we would cookout. i watched many of their games and thought they should have a team in a league somewhere. so tonite i will see them play at the gym. i think it is neat that we are having leagues here on the rez. more of our people should support these endeavors. should be fun…

i got a flyer last week in my email titled ‘take a hike’. it announced a walk across the reservation. it was sponsored by the diabetes prevention program and the division of  planning and environmental protection program. it was held yesterday. so i went. i have to log my miles.

it was a nice day for a walk. around 30 people showed up,  maybe half of them were kids. we all met at the boys and girls club at 10. then we drove to the north part of the rez and left our cars. we walked thru a field then crossed a small creek. then crossed another field and walked along the crick again til we found a place to cross. we continued like that for an hour or so. we stopped by a bridge to have lunch. everyone shared their food with whoever wanted any.

 then we were off again. we crossed another field and went up a hill to another field. as we walked thru this field the tall grass soon rose above our heads. we walked single file and kept each other in sight. then we walked thru a timber and had another  crick to cross. all along the way people helped each other out. adults helped the smaller kids navigate down steep hills. some held the barbed wire so others could squeeze thru as we crossed fence lines.

we passed by a place that once held grave houses that our people used to build when they buried their kin. the houses are no longer there but the people are still remembered. we all climbed on a big cottonwood that had fallen over. that was a good photo op. we took pictures all along the way. it was a great way to walk and enjoy nature. no sidewalks or buildings in sight. just the outdoors. everyone had a good time. the hike took us several hours, i dont know how many miles we walked. everyone should get some kind of exercise, this was a great way to do that. i got to spend the day with my relatives.  i cant wait until the next one.

i am glad that i gave the cigars up. i know they are not good for me. when i caught the flu i just couldnt smoke. as i walked yesterday i could feel that my breathing was better. i missed having my dog with me when i walked though.

i have won two ten dollar world series pool so far. if the yankees win tonite by 1-0 i win the hundred dollah pot. or if they win 9-1, 8-2 or 6-4.  i cant keep up with the combinations. just have to wait til the series is over then tally up the runs. having some cash on the series makes it more enjoyable. will tune into the game again tonite. now i am pulling for the yankees. they used to be my favorite team when i was a young lad. they will be again if they win me some cash…

leah murata

after a breakfast at the casino i headed over to wamego to see my niece leah run in the state 3A cross country meet. i seen lotsa my family there, a brother, my sisters, nieces and nephews. all that family support musta paid off. leah finished 8th in the state with a time of 16 minutes and 33 seconds. she is only a freshman, she still has 3 years to run. if she keeps getting better how good will she be? she medaled in every race she ran this year. i hugged her and later texted her i was proud of her. she is such a good girl. it was such a joy to watch her run. we were running ourselves all across the golf course to encourage her on. i took this picture of her coming up a hill. hope to be back at state again next year.

on the way over to wamego we drove across the rez and stopped within the old rez boundaries. there is a holy cross cemetery south of emmitt. that is where they used to bury some of our people back in the 1800s. the catholics. i spotted a stone that had my great great grandfather’s name on it. was somewhat surprise to see oliver lasley on the stone. another one had some of my other kin. the sad thing is there are blank spaces on the hillside with no markers whatsoever. there are stone markers on the top and bottom of the hill with none in between. there had to be someone buried there. now they lie in unmarked graves. i also noticed a new grave where the old ones used to be. one whole side of the hill had newer graves in it. i wondered what happened to the ones that were buried there. or was there anyone buried there. i also noticed that some of the head stones had been broken at one time. someone patched them back together. some stones were too close each other. musta been moved.

on the way back from being out west we stopped at puffys steakhouse. they advertise as having the best steaks in northeast kansas. dont know bout that but we had a good meal there for a reasonable price. the home made blackberry pie i had with ice cream topped the meal off. after we ate we headed home. we drove across land that used to be potawatomi land. back in the old days the land was pretty much stolen from us. we lost 2/3rds of our rez so the railroad could be built. just another way to justify taking from the indians. the land was bought cheap.

after the days drive we went to the halloween party held at the old bingo hall. it was sponsored by parr. i applaud them for putting on a family activitiy that is alcohol and drug free. it was a fun outing. i got home in time to watch the end of the world series game. i won one of the pools i was in. that is the second pool i won. i hope my luck holds out in the remaining pools. going tune in to tonites game.

seen on facebook some people didnt  have any ideas for a halloween costume. my little baby sister edie didnt have that problem. she dressed up as a bag of popcorn for the daycare halloween party. no really she was a bag of popcorn. see the picture. rumor is she made people feel like renting some movies.

speaking of halloween, parr is sponsoring a dance at the bingo hall saturday nite. they will have a band, kareoke, eats and a costume contest. i say edie has my vote. it is nice someone is doing a community thing. back when we were poor injuns, we would have community events like halloween, christmas and 4th of july. now we aint got no money. its our money but we cant spend it on us.

my danseh wabeno has two beagles named chewie and obi wan. named after the star wars characters. they have a myspace now. i had to add them as friends and put them in my top friends list. i dont get on myspace much anymore since i am playing around with facebook. thing is on facebook i keep getting asked to join some cause. i never join. it aint that i dont play well with others, its just that i have my own causes i do. announcing them on facebook doesnt do anything  for them.

it has gotten cool a few times now. i have started a fire in my stove down in the basement. the tribe brought me some wood since i am over 55 years old. i used to do that all the time but am slowing down somewhat now. the arthritis in my back doesnt allow me to be too active. sometimes i live in pain for a long time if i get carried away. glad they have that program for seniors.

i read a couple books lately since my garden is done. i read susan estall’s The Stolen House of Light. i met susan on the retracing of the potawatomi trail of death. i was surprised that she mentioned me in the acknowledgements in the front of the book. the book is about two friends who decide to move a house to save it from destruction. the house was part of the underground railroad. i read the book in about two days. susan is very encouraging to me in the writing of my book. you can check out her site at or buy her book at www.thestolenhouseoflight.com. a side note, last week or so a house in north topeka suffered fire damage. it was also part of the underground railroad. i noticed the house on rochester road a few times before, so i drove by to see it.

i also read dan brown’s the lost symbol. it is part of the da vinci code series. i read that one in a coupla days too. i had to read it cuz i read the other two and seen the movies.

saturday i plan on going to wamego to see my niece leah run. she is a freshman and is going to state in cross country. that is an accomplishment, she still has 3 years to go. she has done good this year and i havent had a chance to see her run. now i will. i like to support young natives when they do something good. and i love my niece, she is a good girl.

havent decided if i will wear a costume for the halloween party. my sisters are going. i wouldnt know what to dress up as, maybe a burned out hippie indian. i got that routine down…..

every fall my sugar maple changes into some brilliant red and orange colors. then it sheds its leaves. i enjoy the color for awhile tho. my aunt gave me two sugar maples to plant about 20 years ago. one tree didnt make it. maybe running over it with a van had something to do with that. i think of my aunt when the tree has its color. she knew it would be a good specimen tree. i have to agree with her now. i have other trees in my yard that change color during the different seasons. some flower during spring, others have colorful foliage in the fall. i have been waiting for years to see how my trees would turn out. once someone asked me what i had been doing, i replied ‘watching my trees grow’. gotta be patient in that.

so far we have canned 5 gallons of lye corn. well most people call it hominy. i will make some mish mot with some of it.  i think  there wont be anything else left to pick from the garden. maybe some potatoes and onions. that would be about it. it has been a good growing year. i am anxious for next year already.

i went to an auction this past weekend. i didnt buy very much. it is entertainment, like going to the casino.  except a lot cheaper and you have something to show for your money. they have some real characters that show up for auctions. seems like its the same players every time. i go now and then, couldnt make it a regular thing though.

it is world series time again. i dont really have a favorite team. the only drama we can expect from the local team is whether or not they will finish last. they have been for the past 5 years or so. must be nice guys. since i dont follow any team, it is nice to have some cash down on the series. i use to have series pools every year, but someone burned people on a pool once. that was like 20 years ago. once in over 20 years. so naturally some people arent too trusting. they kinda ignorant in that it only happened once. and it wasnt me. i always paid mine. i got tired of the comments ‘how do i know you will pay?’  i would answer ‘you look bright enough, if you dont trust me dont get in’. its that simple. dont take a genius to figure that out. i may get a pool together for some friends and family. hell with the untrusting types. i dont trust people that dont trust me.

someone asked me again bout the sweat lodge thing down in the southwest. i said it was easy to be appalled by non natives that profit from our spirituality. i am equally appalled by natives that exploit our ways. just because they one of us, dont make what they do right. i see others that use a sweat as a ‘confessional’. they live anyway they want, then think a sweat washes away anything bad they did. then they start the cycle over again. that is justifying something. thats too easy. 

 hows that old saying go ‘the only reason i stick around is to see what will happen next’. well what will this week bring…

yesterday my great niece taliyah came to visit me. well injun way she would be my grand daughter. taliyah is the daughter of my niece caroline and her husband sonny. i enjoyed holding taliyah. i have been around little children my entire life. i love kids, even more so now that mine have grown up and have gone out on their own. i have many nieces and nephews, now they are having kids. so i am called misho by many. that kinda ages me somewhat. i enjoy that. i still remember the days back when i didnt think i would live to be thirty years old. at the time i didnt know that  straightening my act out would prolong my life. since then i have come to appreciate life. holding young babies makes me feel young.

i enjoyed visiting all afternoon with my sister and nieces. i ran a sweat last week for some bros. we were talking while we waited on the rocks to heat up. i was telling them how our people used to visit all the time. i remember the days when people would come to visit and stay all day. then they would spend the night. then start visiting again the next day. now we have cell phones, email, etc. and we dont visit like we used to, just too busy i guess. it is usually hi goodbye nice seeing  you kind of conversation with modern technology. i think we lost something we need to get back. i know i still love to visit with people.

i was walking with my dog konugish the past few days. i stop at the bridge by the creek. i usually notice animals. the other day i seen that someone had tossed a deer carcass over the bridge railing. it lie in the water. seemed like a waste to me. some hunters just dont respect the life they took. i told my dog that, he seemed to grasped that better than whoever throw the carcass into the water did.

speaking of my dog, my other dog the one with no name finally left this earth. she was just so old. it was just time for her to go. she barely got around. she used to follow me everywhere, walking, to the mail box and to the timber. she went with me for years until she just couldnt anymore. i dont know how long that dog lived here, at least ten years. she was a throw away dog  no one wanted. i took her and gave her a home. for that she was good to me. i will miss that dog. so will konugish. he acted lonesome for a few days.

i read that surfing on the internet may help the brain from aging. if that is the case then i am doing my brain a world of good. i surf the net daily. it was hell not to have my computer on line for the past week. damn that company that is ripping us off. still havent heard from them. they musta thought i was gonna pay them with food stamps, beads or something. i learned long ago to spend my money where it is appreciated.

i have been taking the seed off my late corn i dried on the cob. my dad gave me an antique that does the job. i kept borrowing his every year. you put the ear with the corn on it into an opening then turn the handle. the cob revolves thru the inside while the kernels of corn are removed. it beats taking it off by hand. i have a canner full now and still have more to do. i may have another canner full. i will save the best for seed next year. then i will make some kakasuwabo. plenty of that. then i will make some lye corn. gallons of that. so i am still enjoying the corn harvest i had this year. i saved most of my produce by drying , canning or freezing. i had enough to give lots of it away. who knows what the next growing season will be like.

the leaves on the trees are turning color. i like the colors. nature is saying it is fall now. gotta get ready for winter.