Saturday, May 26, 2001
SPRING CEREMONIES
The leaves are budding and the ice is melting.
The signs that the spring ceremonies must be done.
I have been told by the spirits and the elders that I must return to the south east section of southern Lake of the Woods, Canada. I do this every spring.
I do my best to obey the spirits.
Through the dream world the messages come and I translate them by offering my tobacco to the elders or the morning sun.
Smudging and feasting my pipe, eagle feathers, eagle whistles, bear grease, bear root, bitter root, lynx pelt, head band, wrist bands, ankle bands, knives, mirrors, beaver, hand drum, all my spiritual objects.
Re-connecting my personal spiritual objects with the spirit world. We all must do this. I am never to loose this connection.
All the years are the same. I hold a feast and feast my spirit helpers.... they come in many forms. The wolf, lynx, bear, buffalo, deer, saskquatch, eagle, hummingbird, lion, tiger, snake, fish, otter, even that whale, many of the white birds, the thunder birds. I must be have them come to me and where I have the ceremony. The food is left on the spot for the spirits. Some will be invited to partake in this ceremony (ween-ko-gay), some do this alone.
Offering of cloth is also good for this time of year. Some buy the cloth from the cloth store. Some make tobacco ties, some make the flags. I do these and I also use my own clothes. These are offered to the spirits for continued connections. The spirits see this and do come to help.
I am so grateful that I have been given the gift to carry out these ceremonies.
One important offering is made from the red willow. It is cut and painted with red ocre, modern day paint is acceptable. The stripped and painted red willow is tied into a old fashioned breast plate. This is a very old and ancient practise. I only know some who still follow this old way. An old man said I was to do this every spring, so I do.
There is a slight problem this past couple of springs. The land I practise on is not my land anymore. The Big Grassy River First Nation and the Ojibways of Onigaming have settled a land claim. Unfortunately, the land I was using was sold.
I am told to keep doing my ceremonies. I do.
The elders and the Negotiation Team for the Assabaska Land Claim that I told about my ceremonies and where I have to perform them did not tell the voting members of the First Nation and the fact went unheard. They chose to leave out the fact that I still use the land. The people voted to accept the land deal, now I am alone. I still do my cermonies. I still talk about the people who kept their mouths shut about me.
Money, honor and image of those in power was more apparant than my sacred old time ceremonies.
It is and always was my dream to bring that Sundance, Raindance and Mediwin back to the shores of the Lake of the Woods. It will happen, I believe.
It is hard to swallow but I am accepting the fact that my own relatives and community members have sold me out for $4,000,000.00. It is to bad they will never see that money, it will go into the maintainence of the oppresive Indian Act on our small community.
It is so sad that my cries for help went unheard at the community level. It is more painful when the territorial Indian organization, the Grand Council Treaty #3; the provincial Indian Organization, the Chiefs of Ontario and the national Indian organization, the Assembly of First Nations ignored my requests for assistance leading up to the referendum. Their primary concern was for the Indian Act Chief and Council. They over look the grass roots people and concentrate on the the protection of the Canadian Government Indian Act Chief and Council. It made me re-think my relationships with those organizations.
Becoming a Chief was my goal for many years. I would help my people.
The Indian Act Chief and Council are destroying Indian culture!
The Indian Act Chief and Council receive this authority from the Canadian Governents legislated Indian Act. The Federal Government of Canada has dirty hands in the game of destroying the Indian and what makes an Indian.
This is against human rights.
The Federal Government of Canada has successfully acquired the art of instituting the Indian to do their dirty work and have the Indian destroy each other.
The Indian Act is a slow killing machine. It kills the Indian through generational time. It is not instant, rather a slow, choking, agonizing death that ends up with an Indian with no language and culture.
This is reminisant of the days of aparthied in South Africa.
This is reminisant of the treatment of the Aboriginees of Austrailia.
The Irish in England.
The South American Indian under Spanish rule.
The American Indian under American rule.
The Siberian under Russian rule.
The people of the south Pacific under American and French rule.
Various African cultures still under European rule.
The list goes on and on.
The only recourse is the spirit world. They hear my prayers. I know they are listening.
My only option is to buy my own land on that shoreline.
In past years, my offerings for the better life, health, and continuation of my people have gone missing. I return to an area where I left my offerings and they are gone. It is told that the Indian Act Chief and Council have ordered the removal of my spiritual objects from the land I was told to use. Who are they to judge my offerings?
The elders tell me to remain strong. The spirits are listening and they make their presence know to all. It is an Indian sin to remove anothers offerings. It is an Indian sin to order someone to remove someone elses offerings.
The elders tell me the spirit knows who the culprits are and will be punished. It is a scary thing to report, but the spirit also says that those who sold that sacred land has also broken ancient spiritual laws and will be punished. I am told to have pity on those who signed away the land and pray for them, because the spirits will have their way with them and it will not be pretty. Some of the First Nation people of Assabaska have already fell ill and some have died.
If only the Negotiation Team and the Chief and Councils told the people about my ceremonies, things could have been different.
Do not mess with the spirits.
The elder tells me that a prophet is not known in his family or community. He tells me to keep walking my walk. I must continue my ceremonies. The elders have also been praying for me and the treatment I have received from my own community.
To many, in my community, I am a monster of sorts. I have been painted with a negative brush and my image is distorted. Any attempts to heal myself is seen in a bad way. They seem to wait for my words and twist the words and it always makes me look very bad.
Physical threats and community isolation is common. I must walk on.
They put me down and laugh at me.
The fact of my ceremonies on the sacred shoreline have been overshadowed by the negativity and hatred towards me by my people.
There are also the people who run and hire the medicine man/woman. They speak very bad of me and have those medicine people shoot me with that 'bad medicine.' Some would call this a curse. I must repeatedly pull out these curses from my body. The spirit tells me that it makes me stronger and that the curse will return to those who put it on me and those who hired that medicine man to 'keep me quiet', I must have pity for them.
They do not realize that I know many of the medicine men and women they know what I am going through.
I say this for understanding.
Many Indians know what I speak of and it is not talked about openly.
Do not mess with the spirits.
Continue your own spring ceremony.
Let the spirit hear you and see you.
The birds are returning and the animals awake.
Everyone has some kind of ceremony to welcome the new season. Some ceremonies are taught through the dreams. Some are passed down through the generations.
After the Indian Act Chief and Council signed away the land so sacred to me and the spirits, it all changed. I honestly do not trust anything they sign anymore. I do not want to be a Chief under the Indian Act any more. My eyes have seen the truth. Instruments of destruction and I am proof.
It is that connection with the spirit that is important.
Continue to pray for your family and people in a good way.
The spirit has ears to hear and eyes to see.