Reznjun

i have been on the road for the past week. i just got home from a conference on the potawatomi language. it was held on pokagan land in michigan. i am new to this job so i am glad i got to go. i needed to meet the players in the language. i knew some of the people from having met them years ago. others i met for the first time. a few of the last remaining fluent potawatomi speakers were also there. i knew a couple of them.

i know that i am rusty from being out of the langauge for a few years. after i lost my mother i kinda let the language slide. i only used it at ceremonies. i know that i have to draw it out of me. i have to play catch up with the ones working in the language. some of them have been doing this for years. i found myself hesitant to speak the language around some because i thought i might not say it right. gotta get over that.

being around people that use the language is good for me. when i hear somebody use potawatomi it reminds me of words that i know but thought i forgot. other things i hear i just dont know. i wanted to get into this job so i can learn more. there is no doubt in my mind that i will learn more. i have already in the first week. i welcome a challenge. if this language was easy it wouldnt be on the verge of slipping away from us. i want to learn as much as i can. question is how much will i learn.

a guy i know at the conference had this neat app on his phone. i think it was called usb disk. he was able to access his language database from his cell phone.  i thought it would be neat to do that without carrying a computer or external hard drive. he was trying to help me get that app for my phone. it wouldnt work. i find out from my phone company it is for iphones. i dont have one, mine is an android. now i got find a similiar application for my phone.

i went online to sprint phone company. i thought that for what i pay them a month they would be able to help me. they werent helpful at all. the tech support gave me an 800 number to call. i got cut off twice and didnt get an answer about a similiar app. i thought their tech support people would know the answer. wrong again. one guy said he would call back, he didnt.  i have a language database i have to check out occasionally when i cant remember a word or phrase. while i am learning i  need to do that. for years i have tried to find a program or application that would be helpful in learning the language. havent had any luck. i will keep looking. modern technology isnt all that great. most techies are about trying to impress people with knowledge than actually helping people with it.

this will be a short work week. i wont argue that point………….

back in my younger day i was shipped off the rez in a greyhound bus to make a better life for myself through the government relocation program. i ended up in the bay area in california. i  didnt quite become the success story the government envisioned for me. i was straight off the rez.  i remember those times as the hazy days of summer. like a drunken haze.  i would hit the street and party. i lived just off the tenderloin area. lots of the lost generation lived there. i would walk to chinatown to buy a huge platter of chow mein for a buck fifty. i would get full and this left me some coin for liquor. i would head thru north beach on the way to fishermans wharf to watch the tourists. they reminded me of fish out of water. there was a circuit of bars i hit on the way there and back. i would walk for miles.

normally  people i met came and went. most were transients i would never see again. i did end up meeting a few people i grew tight with. there was bar that i stopped in just because it had swinging doors like the ones on old cowboy movies. i seen that same bar years and years later in a movie.

one time i walked in that bar and someone said to me ‘ni je na’. i turned and seen an indian guy  sitting there. i said ko nu geh. he asked ‘what’. i said im alright. he said yeah i know. he told me he had been sitting in that bar for about 15 years since the days of the alcatraz take over.  he would always  address everyone he seen with that same greeting. i was the first one who ever answered him in indian. he never forgot that. he was ojibway and his name was bob.  we would share what indian words we knew. we became drinking buddies.

another time i was there i turned and bumped into some big biker dude. i was pretty drunk. i told the guy to get the ^%$4 out of my way. he looked down at me and laughed. he was twice as big as i was. he asked if i wanted a drink cause he liked my guts. i said yeah cause i wanted a drink. he bought me a beer. thats how i met big al. he knew bob and they rode together. we would laugh about how we met. we drank whisky and beer together. now and then we would go into the alley to smoke whatever they had.  or snort a line of something. we would go back in ripped.

i met a yaqui dude at the same bar named wayne. he used to go into these drunken siloquys at the coffee houses. most people didnt get half of what he said. he was a deep dude. he came from what he called meso-america. he was a published political writer. he incited people with merely his words. the government there told him he had 24 hours to get out of the country. he musta made it because he and i drank alot of tequila together. straight up. or tequila sunrises.  he went with a beautiful blond girl from russia. he would often call her a communist. that would piss her off big time. he said he would give me his rough manuscript of the book that got him kicked out of his homeland. i never did collect it.

one other time i walked into the bar i noticed an older black gentleman. he was just sitting there holding his cane watching people. i was kinda broke but i asked him if he wanted to drink some wine. my money wouldnt hold out too long. he agreed. so we drank wine all night. wayne asked me how i knew the prophet. i asked who. he said the dude i was drinking with. turned out he was a deep philosopher type during the hippie days. he knew humanity enough that he could foresee what would happen based on human behavior. thus they named him the prophet. he was usually right in what ever he said. i told wayne i dont know bout all that we just drink wine together. some of the best philosophy i ever heard was expounded over a bottle of wine.

it wasnt long before we held court at our own table in this bar. no one else could sit there. it often got to where no one knew who was drinking what. it didnt matter. we were hard drinking crazies who didnt give a damn. and we did way too many drugs. i was just a kid in my early twenties. these guys had been around the block a few times. they were very intelligent political men. our table had some real good conversations.  i learned alot from these guys. they enjoyed my point of view. people left me alone because i was their friend. we would party all night til we got separated. we bar hopped all over town. i would run into big al and bob around town. i seen them at music festivals or free eats.  a few times they were over in the haight picking up wanna be hippie chicks. we would end up partying. they told he if i ever needed anything to tell them. it was the way they said it that got me. i knew they meant it.

now and then i wonder about these guys. are they still alive. they were years older than me.  anywhere from twenty to forty years older than i was. i cant imagine anyone living too long thru the amount of booze and dope we did. alot of my friends are gone now because of that.  i went back to that bar a few times whenever i passed thru town. just to see it. i didnt go in since i gave up drinking and doping. things can never be the same.  i guess i am just lucky that i still walk this earth. someone has to tell these guys’ story.

hearing about the earthquakes made me think of my southern kin. i had a three day weekend so i decided to go visit with my relatives in oklahoma. i got ahold of them the modern way i text one of them. they in turn called each other. i keep up with them using facebook. i seen their comments about the quakes on there.  i told them if the quakes were over i would come see them.  they said rumors were they expecting a 7.0 one coming but who can predict that. so i drove to shawnee on friday. i met some of my cousins for supper at one of the casinos buffet. we do lot of laughing when we get together. they told me about the earth quakes they had.

i went to visit my oklahoma mother but she wasnt home. she was attending a meeting of some kind. i did get to see the ceremonial grounds there. i used to go down there often. i should have called ahead but this was just a spur of the moment trip. i didnt plan on going, i just went. sometimes those are the most fun trips.

they dont have reservations in oklahoma. so what they do is put up signs saying this is our land. you see a sign that says whatever tribe the land belongs to. then go over the bridge or down the street and they say you are leaving their land. then you see another tribes sign. you leave that land and the first tribe has another sign saying this is our land.  what really says this is our land is having a casino on it. many of the casinos in oklahoma are rather small. not many have hotels since they are in town. i contributed to the local economies of a few tribes.

i have gone to oklahoma many times over the years. i was even born there. i have alot of relatives down there. so it is like a second home. i went  to school there once. i stayed there a few times. i used to go to some big 49s down there. there would be hundreds of people at them. so if i have a chance to go there i go. on the way home i stopped at some little town that sold gas for 2.99 a gallon. cant beat that.

i have been logging some road time lately. this week i am going up north for a language meeting. i havent been to one of them before. i have only been on the job for one week. i have heard more of the language in the past week than i have previously. so that is good. it is the reason i applied for the job. i have been out of the language for a number of years. i am a bit rusty in it usage. it has to come back to me.  at this meeting i will get a chance to meet with the language programs of the other bands. it should be interesting.

will see what this week brings…..

you often hear about karma. like if you do something that aint cool, it will come back on you. sounds like a plausible concept. then on the other hand, you see some people that just generally treat all others badly and nothing happens to them.

i am far from perfect but i try to live a good life. i dont know if i have reaped benefits from that. i guess i have reasonably good health. i enjoy living. i have some good friends and relatives. so i would say yeah there gotta be some kinda karma.

maybe something negative draws other negative energy or something. i remember a family vacation i took years ago. i went back east. i was cruising along and decided i wanted to see atlantic city. maybe it was hearing that ‘under the boardwalk’ song. i wasnt into gambling like i am now but still wanted to try my luck.

it was raining as we drove along. at a distance i noticed this guy walking along. he was all smiling and laughing to himself. he was approaching a water puddle. i slowed down a bit then sped up. the result was we both reached the water puddle at the same time. the car splashed the water all over this dude. he stopped for an instant. then he just laughed and walked on. my kids were young and one said ‘golly dad’. maybe it was cuz i lived thru the sixties and quit drugs or something but i thought that was kinda funny.

we drove through this rugged neighborhood. the kids noticed a drug deal going down. a block or two away we reached the casinos. it was like night and day. we went from real poor to uptown. i went and tried a slot machine. i didnt win. as we were driving out of town i wondered about splashing that dude. was it karma that caused me to lose? maybe or maybe not. hell i never win at gambling.

i finally got word that i will move to a new job with the potawatomi language department. i was one of two that applied for the  two positions of language apprentice. i still had to go for an interview.  i had to explain why i would be good at a job no one else applied for. i was then told to go for a drug test. on the drive down i wondered what kind of drugs i had to sample. turned out it was a urine test to see if i have been a bad boy. the job is mine if the results come back clean. no problemo. i know what the results will be. brown guys like me gotta follow all the rules.

i wanted that language apprentice job. in it i study the language for 40 hours a week.  for me that is a dream job. i studied the language off and on for the past 15 years or so. i helped start the language class we had on the rez years ago. the language program came about as a result of that class.  i kinda let it go after i lost my mother. she was my main teacher. we would work on the language where ever we were, like while garage sale-ing or taking a trip. even if i wasnt studying the language it was always there. now and then i would be doing something and a word would come back to me out of nowhere. i use the language occasionally in ceremonies. i will tell my kids a word or phrase to illustrate a point. so i guess if the language is going to be there i might as well study it full time. i have too many years of my life in it to let it go. and believe me we are in a danger of losing our langauge. thats why we gotta do what we can to save it. most of our people dont care one way or other. someone has to.

i will miss the traditional garden job i held for the past year. i really liked doing that work. thing is i am getting a bit old for it. i put in for a helper so i could do more. that position was turned downed even though it was carryover money that had to be spent. it wasnt even tribal money. someone felt i should do the job by myself since i was doing it. my left knee hurt me for two months from the bending, stretching etc i had to do. it just wouldnt heal.  i had to take care of two large gardens by myself. like i said i am getting older. when someone wants a tradish ceremony i am an elder. other times i am not. it just wasnt that. i had to put up with alot of bureacracy. i made my program one of the best around but i had to wait on the decisions of others to move. i am used to getting things done. i dont like to wait on someone else.  people around the country were aware of what i was doing but not some locally. an news article came out that was picked up by several newspapers. now more know of the things i was trying to do. so i made my point i guess. i still think our people should eat more of our traditional foods. i will always believe that. i will do what i have been doing for the past 26 years. i was doing that before this program ever came along. i will do that the rest of my life.

i am looking forward to this new job. i know that i will continue to learn more of the language. only question is how much will i learn. should be a good week starting a new job. then this is a short week because of the holiday. i have a wedding to do on the holiday at the rock house….cant wait for this week.

lately i have been seeing a young eagle near my house. it was sitting on the fence near my mailbox one day. i seen it fly off as i drove down the road. i parked at my house and watched it fly above me. i noticed it was a immature golden eagle. i could tell that by its black and white tail. i watched it for a few minutes. i thought that was neat. a few days later i noticed it soaring above the hay field. i watched it again.  i remember a couple of years ago i noticed another eagle with a black and white tail that was in the same area around here. it used to roost in a big cottonwood. it must have grown up and left. sometimes new wave injuns get into all that ‘what does that mean?”. i took it to mean that a breeding pair must live nearby.

i came home the other day and saw a pile of wood in my back yard. tribal guys must have brought it. i am on the list of seniors they cut wood for.  i am glad they did. it will get cooler. sooner or later it will be cold. i like to have a fire going in the basement.  it wont be long before i do make a fire. it keeps the whole house warm. nothing like a wood fire to make a house really feel like a home. it reminds me of when we had to have a wood stove going if we wanted warmth.

our little pups moved to the dog house i built last year or the year before. it is located on the south side of the house. it is in a nook that blocks the north and west winds. i put some fresh straw in it last week. so now the pups should be set for the cold that will eventually come. i take care of our animals as well as i can.

i went to a family get together this evening to meet my nephews daughter. she came from arizona. we had eats. indians always have food. we were sitting around visiting and someone got on facebook. so we started to view the postings on it. pretty soon we were all sitting there staring at our phones instead of talking to each other. that is modern society. i was asked if i was addicted to facebook. i laughed. i dont know if i am or not. i do get on there to read. some of the stuff is a bit much. i dont post there too often. sometimes people cant take a joke. it aint funny if you have to tell them ‘this is a joke’ and then slooowllly explain it to them.

i bought a bunch of young chicks this past summer. they have grown to a good size now. i have alot of roosters in the herd. or is it a pack. at any rate i will have to clean a number of them. cleaning chickens is a dying art. everyone used to do that around here years ago.  my mother was a pro at it.  hardly anyone does anymore. i like to put them in the freezer. they will make some good tortilla soup this winter. i can make chicken and rice with them too.  i will keep most of the hens and feed them all winter. i should have lotsa big brown eggs next spring.

i will have to watch tv in the morning. if it snows anywhere near here that is good for a day off……..

 i did go camping this weekend. i wasnt doing it as an act of civil disobedience. the thought entered my mind though.  no bureaucrat  located out in the middle of nowhere should be trying to tell our people what we can or can’t do on our  land. i got to the camp ground late so i missed the tribal police being there. we had moved to another camp spot so we wouldnt have any trouble. to no avail, someone else called tribal. too much traffic they said. it was explained to them we camp out with our kids all the time. no arrests were made.

we camped as we have been doing. we shared some fine meals. everything was cooked over a fire. we had some good visiting, laughed alot. the kids played. the bigger boys went hunting. every one had fun. it wasnt the big deal  a BIA  official thought. there was no need for them to call the police on us like we were doing something wrong. we werent. we had about 8 adults and over 20 some kids that camped. many others came out and joined us for either supper or breakfast. we get alot of community support in our hiking and camping endeavors.

i got there late because i went to a washburn football game with my daughter. they had a 7-1 record. so i had to be a fair weather fan and go support them. it was a good game. i jumped up a few times and cheered the team on. i went to school there many years ago. i found out an instructor gave me an incomplete in an internship so i missed out on getting my bachors degree by this much. at the time i thought hell with it and didnt want to go back to pick up the two credit hour course.  i lost interest in school. i really didnt feel like going into the journalism field anymore. i enjoyed the college experience and consider myself an ichabod backer.

the kids that camped with us went to the trunk or treat thing. they brought back candy. a few of them gave me some candy. i thanked them for sharing. i like it when i see children that know how to share. i feel good about them not growing up to be selfish adults. i like halloween because i can enjoy candy. i got my chocolate fix in. i went to bed earlier than the kids. i wasnt exactly roughing it. i had an air mattress and a sleeping bag. it was comfortable. next day i was told one of the kids asked ‘is that misho eddie snoring’? i had to laugh at that.

after camping i went to a baby shower. my nephew had a daughter recently. i went mainly to visit with whoever showed up. i took a few pictures. they played some baby shower games but i didnt get into that. they were serving indian tacos but i just went for some ice cream and cake. i told the servers to give me something fattening. eating healthy is rather bland. gotta just enjoy food sometimes. i am walking enough that i can spoil myself now and then.

i am still hearing from people about the article written about me. i am getting some fame out of it. as long as they get the message. will see what this week brings.

got back from albuquerque new mexico. i went there for a language workshop.  i heard how other tribes are getting concerned about the loss of their languages. i was surprised some of the tribes that i thought had many fluent speakers say they are worried. it isnt just a few that think that. there were 175 participants from 55 tribes all saying the same thing.

they called for a show of hands of who was fluent in their language. over half the room raised their hand. then they asked how many of their children were fluent. the number dropped to about a handful. i dont know how many of our people realize we lost our last fluent speaker here on the rez.

i had to try some southwest cruisine while down there. i had green chile in half the things i ate. i like hot food anyway. they had some that wasnt too hot and some that was kinda. i tried some mutton stew and had some hot pork at the cultural center. i didnt buy any oven bread though. i had some with my meal.

i was all up for a camping trip this weekend. we have been having them the past few years. we never caused or had a problem. they are family get togethers. we have kids, parents and grand parents. they are alcohol and drug free activities. we cook out and camp on indian land. we have others that come out and join us for supper or breakfast. last fall we had over 70 people involved. many of them take part in our hikes. we do the hikes to encourage exercise. we want our people to live healthier lifestyles. we show kids foods we eat, and plants we use. several of our tribal programs help sponsor the activities. we have many adults to help watch the kids. the kids are always well behaved and mind the adults. there are no illegal activities that go on. we clean up the area and leave no trace we were there.

today i got a call that our camp out may not happen. i guess some one from the Horton B I A office called our tribal police to stop it. i didnt get the reason why. i couldnt imagine any good reason why they would stop the camp out. some small minded official must be real insecure in his/her life and the only way he or she isnt impotent is to exert some perceived power. what a trip. something aint right in that ones life so he or she has to stop others from having fun. we have problems with alcohol and drugs here. nobody stops that. we have thieving going on. that aint stopped. hunting season is coming. where are the tribal cops and the B I A when non residents of this rez come and hunt illegally on indian land? where are they when non residents come to cut the wood off our lands. or where are they when non residents dump their trash all over this rez. the people that go on these camp outs are law abiding citizens. why stop this fun alcohol and drug free activity that has been going on for years. if you can’t figure that out call the B I A office and tribal police department and asked them why are they trying to oppress the indians. they are paid to help us. if they wont do that, then they should leave us the hell alone. or maybe focus on the criminal element instead of everyday people. the BIA should clean its own house before they police the world. does the Cobell case ring a bell?

the article about me that was printed in our tribal paper is still being picked up. the local county paper ran it today. a couple of national indian papers ran the story. a healthy food website ran it.  a friend of mine ran the link on her facebook page. i heard from a few people i know that read the article. the link to the story was sent to the other tribes that are under the same CDC grant as i am.  a big reason our programs exist is to encourage people to eat healthier and get proper exercise. if we dont do that we fail our people. our health will be a big problem for us in the future. we have to do something about it now.  not wait until it becomes a bigger problem. i have to walk my 2 miles- gotta do something about my health……

at work some of my homeboys are building the storage shed to house the garden equipment.  the tractor and its attachments will be stored inside.  it is thirty feet by twenty four feet.  the concrete work is done. one wall is framed and standing. it is twelve feet high. the roof will be higher.  i think it is alright that our workers will do the entire thing from start to finish. i am glad the work wasnt contracted out. i have known these guys  for years. they are good at what they do. it was neat to see neshnabek doing all the work.

on the flip side of that we see others we are paying that wont do anything to help our people. i wonder why are they even here if they dont want to do anything.

i am speaking at the indigenous food festival tomorrow. it will be held at haskell. i used to be a student there long ago. it was a junior college then. after years of jacking around ( i had my alky head on) i did finally get my a.a. degree in liberal arts from there.  i was into the journalism trip. i was young and idealistic. i thought the best way to tell our story was to tell it ourselves.  i am no longer young but i still try to keep a passion for the things i do. i probably will do a power point presentation. i have lotsa pictures i have taken. it is good to have visuals. i will still get my point across though, even if i didnt have pictures. pictures really are worth a thousand words.

one of my dogs had puppies during fall dance. the pups are alittle over two weeks old. their eyes are open now. these dogs arent mutts. they are pure bred heelers. both of the parents are red heelers. one in the litter is a blue heeler. i hope it has good markings. someone already asked for one of the pups. i will keep the choice of the litter here. heelers are smart animals. they go everywhere with me.

last day of week this week. hope it goes by quickly. i love my weekends.

i took a hike sunday. i have been going on them for the past few years.my program is a co-sponsor of them. they are always fun hikes. these hikes are to encourage people to get out and walk. we walk on the rez across indian land. we always pack a lunch and make an all day outing out of it. we walked along big soldier creek. the kids had fun sliding down the creek bank. at another place they were swinging on a vine that was hanging from a big cottonwood tree. we stopped for lunch and made a fire. they roasted hot dogs and hamburgers.  the kids always listen to the adults. they behave themselves. i havent been down this part of the rez for some time. it is nice to go back to areas i havent seen for a while. too much of this rez has changed during my lifetime. its good to see undeveloped areas.

i have been logging miles since i bought my treadmill. i walked 6 miles the first week and 10 miles the next week. already this week i have 7 and a half miles. so i didnt just get the treadmill to hang laundry on. i am determined to lose weight. i have quit smoking the cheap cigars for over a month now. usually there is weight gain associated when you quit smoking. i am really trying to make sure i watch what i eat but that is hard to do.

i found out that the tribes website server filters out content automatically. my site wasnt censored. just a victim of  good protection.  that will be corrected i was told. my blog site/business site is a link on the tribal website. so i was surprised when people told me they couldnt get on to my site from the tribes server. i checked it out and it said ‘blocked by barracuda web filter’. because it contain content belonging to the category of “suspicious sites”.  i didnt have all the facts.  i just went off like i do sometimes if someone aggravates me. so i have to admit i was wrong in saying we live in a fascist state.  sorry. i stand corrected. nice to know we have a good server. i was right though is saying years ago i was censored on the old paper i used to work on.

i have another speaking gig. i will do a presentation at the indigenous foods festival at haskell on saturday. i never write out what i am going to say.  i just get up and speak. i thought my talk at the aarp diversity council went pretty good. they said they enjoyed it. i was asked by one of the men there to come talk to a youth group in wichita soon.

i have been playing with the new ipod i won awhile back. it was a thing sponsored by the language department. i came up with a hundred or two words and phrases. so i won one of the three ipods. i wanted one to study the language with. i will record the things i need to learn and put them on the ipod. my treadmill is ipod compatible. i already tried the system out with some indian music i down loaded. i wanted to see what it sounded like. i could hear it pretty good. so now i will study most of the time i am walking. good deal.

the article about me and the program i work for that was in the last tribal paper will be syndicated in several indian newspapers around the country. i was told i would be famous. hell i dont need famous. but i do want the message about what i do out there. i have devoted alot of years to what i am doing. been preaching this stuff for years. long before this program came along. i will do it the rest of my life. i worked hard to make my program a success.

the temperature is suppose to drop these next few nights. tonight it is suppose to be in the twenties. it will be as cold as an ousted tribal employee at a general council meeting….