SAVAGE

these are smudged necklaces that I made for a client. I’m just showing the products that I sell, but this blog isn’t about the product. It’s about a decision I made. This past year I’ve been approached by an organization from New York State regarding a documentary. They were trying to create about Nathan chasing Horse. The potential for me to participate was there however today, I decided that I didn’t want to get involved.

after knowing that there are so many people out there, pretending to be indigenous they’re claiming to be either Dakota Sioux,  metis  or Inuit. There are so many indigenous academics who’ve never lived in a first nations, Inuit or merus communities.. A lot of times academics have read about, ritual and ceremonies and may have attended a few, but we’re never raised within an indigdnoid community. So the reality of what’s out there in terms of people trying to make money off of ritual and ceremony has become a little bit too outrageous. I've battled many acdenics wgive claimed someone in the gene pool is I dive ois therefore they're indigenous. I've had non-indigenoid people telling me what its kike to follow protocols of swearlidges, ceremonies around sundance who voku teer therefore they've got a privilege to tell me how things work. I grewuo knowing systemic raidm and this is apart of the damage being dine. I will not participate in any discussion around rituals and ceremonies and especially ritual abuse. 

It wasn’t an easy decision yet at the same time I thought about my previous interaction with investigative reporters. A documentary about Nathan Chasing Horse. I thought about the things I went through academically to help them connect with people I knew and people that I thought since my sources had lived experience if actually living within an indigenous community. Who had experience helping indigenous people reconnect? Decades of people trying to reconnect using non-insigenous people to volunteer in rituals & ceremonies. Its got out of hand. 

I didn't really see what I was doing. I documented myself, my interaction with these investigative reporters & now have reflected back on the amount of energy & time I got involved with them. From an acedinic presorctive  I had documented 37 pages. 37 pages of worrying if I was doing the right thing by explaining whibi was,  37 pages not of this blog. It was just interacting with with people who were curious about Nathan chasing Horse. Actually talking, emails exchanges with actual people who actual were publishing my words in articles.  I have the documentation and I wondered why did I stress so much about answering questions and explaining situations. Basically, it’s the only way I could put as was academic.this is not his I inaxt naturally with indigenous people & mainly people in general don't or are not academics.

however, I’m not an academic when it comes to actually living my life in an in the first nations community. I’m not an academic when I’m talking with other people within my circle of friends and community. So the decision I made was to just step back and let it go. I think I believe I’ve done everything I could over the past 17 years to make my readers aware of Nathan chasing Horse and to be aware. To raise an alarm that he was out there and that people needed to be careful. Its much the same way academically. The difference is I am the expert. I am like the professor grading the investigative reporters stories. 

I know, unless you’ve actually been in my shoes you don’t really know the stress that I went through. At the same time too just going through people asking me questions again there was a reflect triggering with a whole bunch of other stressors and things that I never thought I would have to deal with surfaced. When I thought everything was fine academically, people approached me from New York State thinking I didn’t know what its like to live in the USA. Maybe somebody else could do it and the reality is yes there are so many academics out there. So many pretending & rewriting our own history to make money Fir themselves. Basically it was what Bathan Chsding Horse was marketing. He was selling a product, he was recruiting more academics to falsely claim they practiced rituals & ceremonies. They did & he did for their own selfish reasons. It just seemed that whatever I was going to do was going to give anything more justice than what was already done in the First documentary. Then I realized I was t.

I decided I have no as propleceill fibdvtgeir iwn experts to fit their own narrative. I know cause my entire life I've been into another culture during the day & return to my indigenous ways of doing things at night, back home in my own indigenous community. I know egatbits like to live here. People do its like living in a small community. It isn't! People do and put themselves on a platform and I don’t need to worry about that or their narrative cause its a waste of my time.. I really don’t need to interact or engage with people. I do have a sense of duty for helping younger people and I will continue doing that in my TikTok and my social media platforms. 

I’m really grateful for all the invisible helping hands helping me to really think about whether I wanted to help out with another documentary. I asked for advice tonight again and I received good advice from so many and I received good emails back from the people in New York State but today it was just so clear that I don’t need to worry about what anybody says or does I can’t I have no control over their narratives and my experience working within the city and even the politics with truth and reconciliation here in Canada opens up a can of worms. The politics of people who don’t know what it’s like to live in an indugebous community and those who grift or steal my narrative exist. Its lateral violence. There are so many other people who are trying to make money and and getting hired saying that they know what it’s like when they really don’t. And I don’t have the time or the effort to argue with them or to explain to people that are not indigenous (Indisn-yes, I dirty word INDIAN) its who I am, a SAVAGE. Peooke may teach others academically what it’s like to live in any community.  a community where everybody’s been affected by Indian Residential Schools, adoption and foster care. So I’ve just decided that I will not participate in any more interviews from people who want to know about Nathan Kee Chasing His Horse. All the girls that were involved in all the women and men who were involved , it’s up to them to to heal and and he’s in jail. Nathan chasing horses is in jail. He’s there! it’s done!. I don’t need to make an effort and say something needs to be done, it dine! My saying. ‘Somebody needs to stop this this young man.’.It’s done I don’t need to get involved anymore.

 So for those who’ve been reading my blog thank you I’m not gonna end my blog. I just wanted to get some clarity here that I had been approached to help out with another documentary and I have decided not to get involved. People will come yoniwn conclusions as so many keep doing in trying to teach me about what I need to know in being indigenous cause I am a SAVAGE. People don't want to see the cruelty, meanness & hard reality of my outer shell, my persona. They want to place me in a sift fluffy dome. Its not me! 

On my webpage or this blog or any of my social media that’s I use my voice you can’t change it can’t change me. This is why I am living within my truth and I’m gonna talk about it , I’m gonna talk about it with my own voice. I just want to put that out there today because I made this decision and I’m grateful for the clarity that I received and why it’s important for me to step back so again if anybody is part of the team in New York State who is reading my blog or anybody who’s out there knowing that there was a documentary happening. Its going to happen and it will come out, but I’m just not involved with it. 

I know what I know and a grateful for all the things that I’ve been given to me academically. I do live within an indigenous community & I do know what its like & I do receive help from within my community cause I am an elder. I've live in povertymost of my life. I don't need more than what I already have. When non-indigenous people see what I have they get defensive. When investigative reporters see me they feel my helpless ess & want to help. They don't see this helplessness is my inter strength. Its my humbleness I carry. Its me being a SAVAGE! )I am being academic ir in western way of thing, I'm being ironic)

My people Dakota Oyate Black Hills 2024

 100,000 Sioux (7 Council Fires) still live & are alive & well celebrating life & celebrating love. 

Is it any wonder why I spend so much time writing my soap opera stories so that non-indigenous peoples have space to understand us. I've grown up around non-indigenous people my entire life. 

15,000 or more dancers is a guess… 

I don't mean to belittle anyone by saying my stories are soap opera stories but I can only imagine what it must be like from another cultural view point. 

Some people say they remember me & others say if course, I say & pray for all people to release someone with protective, reflective healing energy. When I bare witness to people I see a change. In seeing this change I know those prayers of those who are now in the spirit world as grandfathers & grandmothers change through the power of our prayers. I see it in those who celebrate life & celebrating love in this fourth deminsion called time. Creator, grandfather, grandmother thy will is done.  We are all related. 

New charges for Nathan Chasing Horse

 https://youtu.be/DYvUxHHJloQ?si=V3WzGSFGNEPrcq_s

Since the charges were dropped & speculation about what's going to happen next is out there. I had more people wanting my explanation of this situation. People need to vent their frustration or people who genuinely care & then there are those women who are just cruel. 

Years ago a warm compassionate woman taught me something about being a good woman. I had no understanding of boundaries. It's not uncommon for so many women. It all started when I was director of education. I met two therapists who were establishing their practices working within an Indigenous culture from a non-indigenous perspective. 

Both did play a major part. She died at 55 & he's 79. Both were there for me at the beginning & end of my ‘soap opera’ journey in understanding the components of healing. I'm writing this hope for women who may feel impatient about their healing journey. She told me at the beginning that once I started this process I could never return. For me, it felt like wanting to be an ostrich starting to hide my head thinking nobody would ever see me. She was right. Writing my blog is like lifting my head out of the sand knowing I can know the stages of relapse & recovery. Mostly too, many shrink away from these words cause they equate recovery & relapse with addiction. 

 I wanted to mention there is a beginning or an abstract understanding of a beginning. Little did I realize the impact it would have on me an.elder knowledge keeper for young women. Its really a reflection on what happens as we age if we choose to not challenge our perceptions of our own reality based around healthy human sexualiry. Years ago as my friend would tell me about the history of women, most git married were virgins. Most learned the violence of men on their wedding night & would carry their sexual response as being the norm. Talking about how women would find the courage to leave such abusive relatiohios is the corner stone of a beginning. 

The History of Linerance came out of supports groups of women who supported each other in groups of spouses whose partners were alcoholics or drug addicts. These women went tgrought a journey of self reflection & started identifying their adductive thoughts. Thoughts that enabled addictive thoughts around their attachments to their partners. For most battered women this self reflection was a life or death situation with most leaving for their own safety. The more women in recovery from abuse, the more need Fir them developing a twelve step program around this attachment disorder or thus self-defeating behavior. A behaviour that had a beginning. A behaviour where a story of survival was created. 

My friends did say once I started there was no way I could ever return. She said that I would acknowledge why it took me so long such an abstract beginnings of what eliminating such self destructive thought patterns did for me. . And, yes it takes time & patience. My mom called it self love. It also meant taking on the acceptance of what I allowed. I'm gratefully acknowledging that I really appreciate the many women who helped me. In my study of psychology so many taught me or in an abstract sense of having invisible helping hands. (look for limerence support groups) 

Yes, a beginning, there were two indigenous women who both were very promiscuous in their youth. What do they have to do with my journey is that I'm grateful that in my journey I've seen these women have children & grandchildren. I believe they truly believed they were each others best friend. Both appeared to be advocates for beaten & battered women. I say appeared. 

Here my story, when I made a pokice report of being SA 20 years after. These two were in the court room. In hindsight they were like two vultures waiting the their next meal to die. I jest cause in reflection after knowing what they did afterwards. After my perpetrator wafoubd guilty & sentenced. The one went to her uncle helping him sell his cattle. She wanted him consolidated his physical assets into cash. She thought that since his son was found guilty I would take his family through civil court suing for danages. This of course was the furthest from my mind. 

Yes, my soap opera story, did happen. I say soap opera cause I live in a small community where people who get involved suddenly with family member other famiky members question. So, yes her Cunningness did get back to me through her cousin. A cousin who owns cattle herself. A cousin said their excuse for selling the uncles cattle was to help him with his finances. This action took place shortly after my perpetrator started servicing his two year sentence. They really thought I was out for revenge and again this was the furthest from my mind. 

My late father had thus saying of actions speaking louder than words. So yes, her actions of falsely appearing to be supportive of me or any other women who seek justice are not credible. And thus is the rub of holding space for victims is to listen cause its not her story rather its the victim's truth, her story. 

Action is healing, there's is an action. For me, as an advocate is to self-reflect. Challenging, giving it a name, holding space & to finally bare witness. Little did I know it would take decades.

Human behaviour of holding onto to a self defeating thought not understanding just how self-destructive it is in denying oneself happiness. Deconstructing a thought, deconstructuring an addiction dies not happen within a week, months a year. Its a lifetime journey of self discovery if you have the courage to take the first step.

As a knowledge keeper, an elder indigenous woman, I am grateful. My late dad would also say ‘it ain't over under we are six feet under ground!’ It apears I am lonely & alone. It appears that I am not holding space for another. Its taken me decades to understand this transition from a childhood thoughtful meaning releasing it to transform into an adult. Some human beings never transform & remain in their childhood. 

We are responsible for how we treat each other. Decades before I met Nath  Chasing Hotse I met a Kiowa man from Oklahoma.I tell my soap opera story about being intimate with him to my cousin. She said ‘You.told him what?’ I told him I loved him. My cousin said she would never tell any man this & I told her I did believe I felt live for him. I explained to my cousin the reason for telling him I loved him. I had to work with him. I rushed losing my business connection. I needed him to help me with a mebtal health project. I trusted him. It took baby steps before him there was another & afterwards each man was an like invisible helping hand. I had to explain this Limerent I had for him. He understood it wasn't LOVE rather a false feeling that I was dealing with. He needed to know it was a false narrative, illusion or delusion about him. If he could be patient & understand my motives were not to seduce him or gain favor. I know my cousin probably thought all man want sex & not to be vumberable. I mean I don't like men who are in limerence with me.

Its one of the main reason why I remained single my entire life. It doesn't mean to say I am asexual. I've learned being human means holding onto healthy human sexual responses. People don't need to know what I keep sacred. Let feelings come. 

Its Thanksgiving weekend 🍂🦃