Caretakers' Culture and PowWow

The plants are fully-leafed; the grasses rise like flags with their seeded heads adding pollens to the season of rebirth; fledglings fly over head and on the heels of their parents looking to be fed, Mother Eagle targets the resident hens; and our two-on-the-prairie world of the winter changes as human people and activities fill the Prairie Front and South Whidbey Tilth.  

In the traditions of my Ancestors a Caretakers' Culture builds upon the shoulders and foundation of  love and respect for the 'aina -- the land and all the beings who interconnect--, people being part of that connection but not reigning over any of the others. On a regular and cyclical basic there are ceremonies, rituals, and prayers of asking for permission and listening for answers, before assuming my needs entitle me to what I want.

I look to the elemental forms for guidance: notice the wind and his direction, notice the clouds as they change and now that Pele is fierce in her molten-making activity I feel the movement of change internally though Hawaii Island is more than 1,200 miles away. That distance still travels the same 'skin and gut' of the same body ... Earth.

Clouds overhead on Whidbey Island

Clouds forming as lava flows into the ocean near Pahoa on the island of Hawaii days a go.

Living with Environmental Illness and allergies sharpen my awareness of Ancestral protocols. In many respects my body moves so much differently than the pace of my contemporaries, and we, Pete and I,  learn to anticipate how one action will affect the next and that string of choices and actions may cost me hours, days or months of recovery unless I/we ask for clarification before hand. With the grace of the gods, loyal allies and timely breaks, road trips and helpful dreams we make it through. Sometimes there's collateral damage when the communication is messy and a do over and course correction is the way.

The month of May has been a time of steep learning curves negotiating with many people who have a culture set in their patterns.  I appreciated reading and applying the new-to-me writing of a young woman, Sarah, who observed "How to Approach the different Astrological Sun Signs" (Water: Scorpio, Cancer, Pisces; Fire: Aries, Leo, Sagittarius,  Air: Gemini, Libra, Aquarius; Earth: Taurus, Virgo, Capricorn.) Astrology is one of the sources I turn to and tap a broad view of navigation metaphorically and practically.

Pete and I are both Water signs but not the same water sign. It helped me to remember that. Adjustments are sometimes difficult, especially when they come at us quickly, and we haven't had time to get our bearings before the next wave of change comes at us. To be in sync while we cross this new territory of negotiating with more than one or two people at a time, I felt the need to check the water level of my most intimate and trusted partner: How much reserve energy did we each have? How much energy did we have collectively?

In particular, I embraced Sarah's observations about Water signs when she wrote,

"Water signs, Cancer, Scorpio, and Pisces are very receptive to feelings.." She clarified. "That’s not to say water signs don’t have the ability to be rational or don’t have the ability to take in a thought or anything like that. We all have different charts with different placements in different elements that make up our own personalities. From a very basic stand point though, when you’re dealing with a water signs they will most likely do best when someone comes to them from a feeling place first. They need it to be detailed and filled with feeling so they can feel it too."

PowWow vendor had just the earrings I have sought for a long time ... to celebrate and decorate hearing ... the heartbeat of the Drums (the heart beat of the culture)

The odd magic of this time, when adaptation is paramount to survival, came as my Scorpio body wisely closes one of the senses in order to feel my way through the rough tides. For weeks through May and into June the onslaught of pollens have shut down my hearing; this is not the first time my ears have done this. To deal with the external world, I must listen from within. These ears are no small funnels of collection. These are elephant's ears, and they have a knowing that goes to old places for refuge.

June will bring more change to the partnership we have with the South Whidbey Tilth Community. I asked a good friend who is also a Buddhist Priestess living with Environmental Illness (and a Leo Sun-sign) to offer me  counsel and insight. She wrote her reflections and allowed me to see into her circumstances. I felt her message. I was moved, provoked were my heart and mind to act on crafting an agreement, a contract to describe a Caretakers' Culture. In part she wrote:

"Community is a very interesting and fluid subject, and these are extremely potent and challenging times to connect with others.  There is definitely more urgency now.   You are very lucky to be living on Whidbey, where folks, by and large are stable and oriented towards sustainability.  Our situations are perhaps different in focus;  you and Pete are becoming an integral part of an existing community, and need to adapt to their standards, and figure out how to evolve them.   Though I have been active in various Buddhist communities both here and in Japan and even on the outskirts now of one allied Tibetan Buddhist community here in Portland, I largely am interacting with just a few members of that community because of health boundary, not the community at large at public meetings and gatherings ... I need to create and lead a new visioning of place and boundaried community that will be welcoming and contributive to those interested in Buddhism and seamlessly meet my environmental health needs and not make a separation because of illness, neither denying or focusing on suffering, limitation, etc. (my emboldened emphasis)We canaries have to create a new good enough regenerative/sustainable normal for everyone, as pretty much everyone is on the path to becoming ill." - Mahalo nui and aloha in all ways to our friend for permission to use this quote here!

To ride the waves of this changing culture on the Prairie Front it helps to have places and people we can go to sit with, laugh with, dance with and feel an embrace of acceptance; feel the heartbeat of connectivity. And especially during the hours of being inside at the Annual Tulalip Veterans PowWow, in spite of congested ears I could hear and feel the deep resonance of the drum's heart beat.

Inimitable.

It's important for most of us beings to be reassured as new definitions of interaction and interactivity challenge the used-to-be. Another old friend gave me this useful tip as I listened to her with one slightly unclogged ear: "Find a way to chill and calm. Enough to feel the magic. Then, be the magic."

One Saturday in May we sought out good friends on Whidbey to share laughs; lunch-- Star Store croissants filled with sliced meat and avocado--; a four-chord ukulele melody and lyrics about white sandy beaches; and watched as Pelicans flew over in their straight row. A week later (just yesterday), we drove to the Clinton ferry dock boarded the Tokitae and headed for the Tulalip Rez for PowWow.

West Beach fun ... thank you Martin, Teri and Cindy.

We arrived at the gymnasium just before 1:00 PM where the crowd of audience, family, dancers, and drummers gathered. We stood at the doorway. Pete from his higher perch of a position said, "The seats look pretty much booked." I stood in front of him. I felt the magic building even as my ears were closed against so much other sounds, I could hear the heart. Without turning to see where Pete was my feet took me across the floor weaving through gathering dancers, the direction of the M.C. and the seemingly fully occupied bleachers.

There at the base of the bleachers were two very narrow unblanketed (markers/place holders) places for two tiny butts like Pete and mine to fit. I laid my markers down (my cushion and my straw hat) and looked back at the doorway to signal to Pete but the ceremony was beginning and I could not catch his eye.

For ninety minutes I sat next to a family of dancers and singers and within inches of the drum and the drummers. I watched the dancers as they helped each other with their regalia -- fashioning security to a moccasin using masking tape worked; the back and forth contact between members of that family their facial features marked them; I watched. For the next ninety minutes my heart opened generously and appreciately to the magic of the Drum, the Voices, the spirit of family and the collective soul.

When Roxanne White, organizer and voice for Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women took the microphone and spoke of the many who are taken from this world as though they are invisible I heard. A blanket was spread on the gymnasium floor and anyone and everyone was invited to put what they could to raise funds to help the cause. Then Roxanne sang and then led the audience in dance. The M.C. opened the dancing to everyone who has been affected or been in an abusive situation. I rose from my place and joined her. There was a place for me to add my presence. I danced!

Almost fifty years ago when I was a newly-arrived and transplanted woman from Hawaii,  25 years old, my first job was that of a Head Start teacher here on this same Tulalip Reservation. I had so much to learn, history yet to realize was lost; and so many lessons to discover. This gymnasium was a vision of future magic. These people of Tulalip and all the tribes who came to join them would relearn and restore their cultures to a vibrant and ever evolving Caretakers' Culture. This one happening now ...

When I finally did find Pete he said he had been sleeping on the grass outside, prone and stretched fully on the Earth with his eyes shut. He felt the drums. He felt the heart. He felt the beat. He said he heard one of the dancers comment, "I was flying." With one less source of stimulation (sight), Pete could feel the concentrated magic.

We water signs found our way -- personal paths -- to the magic.

UPDATE: I have removed the videos of Saturday's Pow Wow, and correct my enthusiasm for the power of the event out of respect for the singers, dancers and people because I didn't ask permission before hand. Many people photographed and recorded throughout ... I was swept up and was excited to share our experience.

My apologies for any disrespect to the culture and the protocols. I know better, best to practice knowledge, integrate the potential into wisdom to come or what am I really about?

E kala mai au. Mokihana