BEING INDIAN IS part 3

BEING INDIAN IS...having a large family of over a million brothers and sisters!
BEING INDIAN IS...feeling that Little Bear, Prays-for-All, Big Heart are more beautiful names than Jones, Smith or Brown.
BEING INDIAN IS...watching cowboys shoot to kill 40 of your kind with a six-shot revolver on the TV late show without getting a scratch.
BEING INDIAN IS...observing your children watching a cowboy and Indian TV western movie and cheer for the cowboys.
BEING INDIAN IS...joining the U.S. Army to save your country from the perils of aggression, and against the U.S. Army on your reservation to keep the Army Corps of Engineers from stealing your sacred land.

Rita Ayeni, African-Cherokee

BEING INDIAN IS...graduating from a government Bureau of Indian Affairs school and not being able to read a 6th grade English book from your white friend's urban school.
BEING INDIAN IS...having your child come home from school and ask you about the "strange beliefs" of the Indians that his/her teacher mentioned in school today.
BEING INDIAN IS...never making quick evaluations of people, but reserving judgment until their actions show what kind of people they really are.
BEING INDIAN IS...feeding anyone and everyone who comes to your door with whatever you have.
BEING INDIAN IS...knowing the Great Spirit.

BEING INDIAN IS...having a Christian missionary tell you it is wrong to believe in more than one Divine Being, then listening to him tell you about God, Jesus Christ, the Holy Ghost, the Virgin Mary, St. Joseph, St. Patrick, St. Christopher, St. Francis, your spirit, your soul, etc.
BEING INDIAN IS...never giving up the struggle for survival.
BEING INDIAN IS...standing up for life principles and truths unashamed without having compromise your values.
BEING INDIAN IS...not only being proud of who you were born from, but mindful of how you conduct yourself in the world.
BEING INDIAN IS...to have your liberal white friends urge you to follow the same path as your Black brothers to gain some advantage.

photo: Native American - Harriet Prince, Anishinabe Elder in ceremony with Uncle

BEING INDIAN IS...having your friends and relatives accuse you of being a traitor if you seek an education, earn more than $7,000 a year, wear a white shirt and tie, drive a car less than three years old, and live in a three bedroom home.
BEING INDIAN IS...having heard your grandparents and yourself say, "When they honor the treaties and we get our land claim payments"...then suddenly realize your children are saying the same words also.
BEING INDIAN IS...having your non-Indian friends go on a Vision Quest led by a white man to the mountains, but leaving you home because you can't make the $300 registration fee to attend.
BEING INDIAN IS...listening to your well-intentioned white brother try to tell you about your native spirituality.

group of Indians in ceremony around sobriety

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