Crow Dog : Four Generations of Sioux Medicine Men (9780062200143) (8 page)

That day I danced as I had never danced before, with twenty-one hoops. People told me that it was the best dance they had ever seen. It was my last dance. After it I hung up my hoops. They were for a boy, but now it was time for me to become a man.

During the days I did the hoop dance I also performed the gourd dance, and right in the gourd, in the rattle, there was a spirit talking to me. As I was shaking the gourd, the spirits talked to me in little ghostlike voices, encouraging me.

I also performed the eagle dance. I could never do it as well as my father. Nobody could; he was the best ever. When he danced he turned into an eagle before your eyes. When you do the eagle dance you blow on your eagle bone whistle, and
through it you communicate with the eagle. This sacred bird is a messenger making a bridge between you and the Creator. When you dance the eagle dance a power gets hold of you.

I did the rope dance, spin rope dancing, which stands for the tying-up ceremony called yuwipi. The rope should really be a rawhide, not just a lasso. My father said, “The rawhide makes a straight road; follow it.”

I also did the stomp dance. Once I practiced it in a little grove of trees. There were some big oak stumps and, dreamlike, they turned into people with long hair and old-time buckskin outfits. I knew that they had long gone to another world and, as I watched, they turned back into oak stumps. Dancing often gave me visions like that.

I was growing up. I had six brothers born before me, but they all died. So I was the only son left, the only root. That put a heavy load upon me.

When I was fourteen years old, a whole string of bad things happened to me. Some boys came up to me and said, “Let’s go for a ride!” I didn’t know they had stolen the car in Colorado and changed the license plate. They didn’t do a good job on it. They tried to put a new color on the car and messed that up too. But I didn’t know anything was wrong. One of the boys suggested that I drive. They did this so that, if they were stopped, it would look as if I had stolen it. Naturally we ran into some police and they spotted that something was wrong with the license plate and that somebody had tried to repaint the car. They had us cold. They wanted to see my ID and driver’s license and, of course, I didn’t have any. The other boys said I had stolen the car. They lied and lied. At that time I spoke hardly any English. The police believed them, because I could not make myself understood. I did time in a reformatory in Littleton, Colorado. I learned to be a car mechanic at Littleton, and I am still good at fixing old clunkers. But being in the reformatory was hard for me. I was used to roaming, to riding, to swimming. I suffered from being cooped up. I was in there for one year and one month.

At age sixteen I worked for two months on a farm in Nebraska, for a Japanese man. Then I went back to South Dakota to work on a ranch, for five dollars a day. That was the only kind of work for an Indian then. After that I got into trouble again. Some kids had gotten drunk and rowdy and the police put them in a panel truck. I happened to be there, so the cops got on my case too. It made me mad. The panel truck was still standing there and I managed to creep up and open the door and let everybody out. They ran off in all directions. So they booked me for trying to escape and resisting arrest. But this time I was in for a very short time. It seemed that in those days every kid was in jail sometime. If you were a teenager and an Indian and were found someplace away from home, you had to be guilty of something. That was the attitude of the white police. And you had to go outside to find work. In court you couldn’t understand anything that was going on. You couldn’t understand the language they used. You got a white court-appointed lawyer you couldn’t understand either. He did nothing for you because, win or lose, he got paid. So he spent as little time on you as he could get away with.

After that I did farm and ranch work again for about three years. I did a lot of planting and harvesting beets. When there was no more farm work I got a job at a body shop. I learned from one of my friends by watching him work. He used a torch, a heat torcher. You heat it to a certain temperature and you press it. If you do it right you can’t even see where the dent was. But if you do it wrong, you crush the fender, you wrinkle that tin all up. So I did this to make a living. But it was tiresome and wore me out. I had to work on every car they brought in. Then I learned to cut glass for car windows. When you start cutting that glass, you’ve got to have strong hands and be careful. You can’t mark it too well. You’ve got to use a heat glass cutter. You heat it and you mark the glass with a steel wheel. I was sixteen years old when I began doing that kind of work.

My dad said to me, “You are about ready to get married and
have children.” I thought so too. Among the Lakota we get to be fathers and mothers early in life. I took on a new name—Defends His Medicine—which represented our sacred plant, peyote. Sage and peyote are our two great sacred medicines. The Native American Church, the peyote church, has always been under attack by the white man. It needs defending. That’s why I took that name. So I stopped doing farm and ranch work, which kept me from being what had been shown to me in my vision. I became a spiritual man.

A spirit had picked me to be a medicine man. Grandfather Peyote had chosen me to be a road chief of the Native American church. Before I could even begin along that path I had to go down into the pit and be buried in it and come to life again through the power of Tunkashila. And I had to have a vision to point the way. I had to go up the hill, “crying for a dream,” as they call it. But even before that, I had to be purified.

To be purified you have to go into the sweat lodge. My father called on Good Lance, who had the power and the knowledge, to help purify me. He also asked another relative who was a spiritual man, Frank Arrow Sight, to help. They instructed me, “Before you do anything of great importance in your life, you purify yourself in the initi. Going on your first vision quest could be the greatest moment in your life, so preparing you for it must be done right. This sweat bath must be something special. It is sacred.”

We have our sweat lodge at the edge of Crow Dog’s Paradise, close by the stream. Whape washtemna, Indian perfume, grows there. Waterbirds fly over that spot. The way we do a sweat, we stick sixteen willow saplings in the ground in a circle—the number sixteen is sacred to all Indian people, not only the Lakota. So four times four willow wands make the frame, the skeleton of the sweat lodge. You bend them at the top and tie them together so that they form a dome, like a beehive. You cover them up with canvas, a tarp, or blankets. In the old days it used to be buffalo robes, but these are hard to come by now. At every step of making the sweat lodge you pray.

In that little sweat lodge, the whole universe is contained. It is the Creator’s home. In the center we make a hole, a perfect circle. We place the sacred rocks in this hole. Inside we make a carpet of sage to sit on. Sage is a holy herb and makes the spirits come in. The earth one takes out of the center pit you make into a little mound outside the lodge. It represents Unci, Grandmother Earth. And beyond that you make peta owihankeshni, the fire without end. For wood my father used dry branches from the trees. They had to be laid in a certain way—first four sticks running west and east, and seven sticks running north and south. As my father laid the sticks down, he said a prayer.

The door of the sweat lodge always faces west. Only at the home of a heyoka, a thunder dreamer, or “contrary,” does it face east, because a heyoka has to do everything differently from anybody else. Never does the lodge entrance face north. From the door to the Grandmother mound, it runs in a straight line. This is inyan chanku, the path of the sacred rocks. Along it the red hot stones are passed into the lodge.

Good Lance told me, “Let yourself see the generations as you set the wood on fire. Think of passing the sacred flame from generation to generation.” When the fire had gone down my father placed the first twelve rocks on the glowing embers. They represent the twelve sacred eagle feathers handed down from grandfather to grandson. I had to go down on all fours to crawl into the
lodge. “That is to teach you to be humble,” said my father, “to show that you are no better than your four-legged relatives.” We were naked as we were born, because the sweat lodge is Grandmother’s womb, the earth womb, and I was to be reborn in it. We entered the sweat lodge clockwise. My father sat at one side of the entrance, Good Lance at the other. My cousin brought in the heated rocks, one by one, on a forked stick. My father grabbed them with a pair of deer antlers and put them into the center pit. He placed the first seven rocks, which represent the four sacred directions, the center of the universe, the sky above, and the earth below. They also represent the wakichagapi—if you have loved ones who died, you remember them by this. My father sprinkled sage and cedar over the rocks. As it burned it made a whispering sound, like a spirit voice. Then more rocks were placed in the pit. Finally, my cousin passed a pail of water into the lodge and lowered the entrance flap over the door.

Inside we were huddling in total darkness. All I could see was a red glow from the heated stones. I could feel their warmth. Now I knew that I was truly in Grandmother’s womb, in the darkness of the womb, the darkness of the soul. In the warmth and moisture, I felt that this was myself before being born.

My father said, “The inipi uses all the powers of the universe. The fire, the water, the earth, the air are here, within the sweat lodge. Feel the power of inyan wakan, the sacred rock. All living things are in here.” The scent of burning sweet grass and sage was around us like a blanket. I tried to catch this smoke with my hands and rub it all over me. My father prayed. He sang the songs. Then he poured cold water over the red, hot rocks.

All at once the initi was filled with white steam. It curled around us and enfolded us. It was very hot, so hot that I thought the steam would burn me up. My lungs seemed to be on fire. But I knew that this was a blessing, that it was the breath of the Creator purifying me. And out of the hot whiteness I heard my father’s voice: “Immersed in this cloud, you will be cleansed. You will be prepared.”

I prayed to Tunkashila as I had never prayed before, and I felt the spirits coming in, talking to me in spirit talk, touching me. Then the flap was opened. Good Lance sang, “Grandfather, you are the light of the world. Take care of us. Teach us, Grandfather, each morning, each evening. We ask you to have pity on us. Prepare our minds for this purification.”

More rocks were brought in. Then the flap was lowered over the entrance. More water was poured over the rocks, and again Grandfather’s breath enfolded us. And again I heard my father’s voice: “Cultivate your mind, for all medicine goes there. Center the mind on the spirit. Ask the sweet grass to show you the way. Your vision will tell the rest.”

This was a four door sweat, meaning that the flap was opened and closed four times, and each time everything was repeated. I had the privilege to talk every time the flap was lifted, but what we talked then I’ll keep to myself. After the fourth door we were given cold spring water to drink. And my father said, “The moment we drink the sacred water of life, we receive its blessings. The moon brought all the waters together, from a tiny drop, to a lake, to a river. Let your mind flow like the water.”

We finished by smoking the pipe. It united us as if we had been one body. The pipe bowl of red stone coming from the sacred quarry, the only place in the world where you can find it, that is the flesh and blood of the Indian. The smoke coming from the pipe is the Creator’s breath. Then it was over. I had been made ready for the vision quest. I had been reborn.

While I had been in the sweat lodge, my older sister Delphine made a flesh offering for me. My aunt was cutting forty tiny squares of skin from her left arm. As I passed her, I saw a tiny trickle of blood making a red line from her shoulder to her elbow. She was making a sacrifice to help me get through being alone on the hilltop for four days and nights without eating or drinking. The tiny squares of her flesh were carefully wrapped in red cloth, which was tied to my sacred pipe. I would take this with me on my hanbleceya to comfort and encourage me, to make me know
that someone had suffered to help me get my vision.

We still have our allotment land. Part of it is down near the road, by the river. It is where we have our sun dance every summer. The other part is up on the hill. That is Crow Dog’s sacred place. Before giving me the pipe with flesh offerings, Arrow Sight asked me if I was prepared to fast for four days and nights. I nodded. Then he put me up there. There is a stream running through our land with a tree trunk across it. So we crossed on that and walked up to the hilltop. There is a flat place up where, in 1974, we brought the ghost dance back. There’s cedar and pine at this place. Eagles circle over it. You hear the coyotes yapping, singing to the moon. It is beautiful and lonely up there. All you hear are the sounds of nature, animal talk, the wind blowing through the trees. In the center of all this is our family’s vision pit. It is formed like an “L” pointing the wrong way. First you go down and then crawl across until you come to the dead end. That is the spot where we sit and cry for a dream.

Arrow Sight told me to take my moccasins off and walk to the sacred ground barefoot. On the way, he let me stop four times. Each time he sang “Tunkashila, I am coming to see your power. Anpetu, today, see me, see me. With the sacred pipe I am coming to you to sacrifice myself, to learn, to see my sacred roots. I give myself to the sacred pipe.” Tunkashila is the grandfather word for Great Spirit. Frank Arrow Sight made me walk four times around the vision pit. He made me put up four sacred direction flags: red material first, then the yellow, then the white, and then the black. So we put up these colors at four points around the vision pit. And then we put up a center pole with an eagle tail feather tied to the top and a deer tail farther down. Then I connected the four direction flag sticks with four hundred chanli, tobacco tie offerings. Finally we made an altar out of gopher dust—an Iktomi, or spider man, altar.

After that Arrow Sight took wachanga, sweet grass, and smoked up all the flags and sacred things and made everything holy. “Go around, clockwise inside the hanbleceya grounds four
times,” he told me. “Think only good thoughts. From your vision quest bring something good back, something good for yourself, something good for your people. Stay inside the tobacco ties, stay inside the four colors. I go back down now, back to the sweat lodge and your father. But through spiritual power, we will be with you, we will feel physically and spiritually whatever you feel—your fears, your hopes. We will be praying for you.” Then he left me alone up there with my thoughts.

I was afraid. I did not know what was going to happen. I might be rejected. I might not be given a vision. I would be up there alone for four days and nights, without food, without water. It would not be easy.

The first night, sometimes I sat close to the pit entrance, my head above ground. All I could see at first was a red circle. That’s all. Then I crawled back into the hole, all the way, and I heard somebody walking on the left side—a rustling, like a scattering of kindling. I heard birds, heard an owl whooping four times. That is what I heard and saw the first night. All the time I was sitting there, praying, holding onto the pipe with my sister’s flesh offerings tied to it, I was thinking that somewhere near were some of my ancestors’ graves. I felt their presence. Then, at dawn, before the sun came up, at the west I saw a spark, a little red hoop, and I saw something like a lightning bug coming in the entrance. It made a clicking noise, like knocking small stones together. And I heard a voice: “Some things are still sacred. The spirit will direct you.”

During the day I stayed in the pit. I lost all sense of time, of feeling. I was like dead. I wanted water but tried not to think of it. I was in a different world, in a different dimension. As the second night started, I looked out. Wiyatki, the Big Dipper, was halfway up. The evening star went down. It clouded over. It was pitch dark. Darker than dark. I prayed hard. And a white, shiny, fast ball came from the north. As it was coming toward me I gripped my pipe. A voice was coming out of it: “Power is going into your body. It is coming. It does not speak, but you will know. The
iktomi power is given to you.” Then it hit me like a blow, like being struck by lightning. I crawled back into the pit as far as I could. I heard people talking but could not see them. Then I saw tipis, horses, deer, buffalo. I was in another time. I heard children playing and laughing. I heard somebody saying, “Wauntinkte, we’re going to eat.”

All during the next day I was half awake and half asleep. I didn’t know anymore what was real and what was not. I was really hungry. I wanted water. But then I saw a woodpecker on top of one of the pine trees. Did I really see it or was I dreaming? I heard him hammering against the tree. Then I heard someone say, “You are standing on wakan makoce, on sacred ground. Be happy. You are suffering now, but you are being given a power that will help you later in life.” So, toward evening, on my third night, I crawled out just a little. The morning star was shining on me. I wasn’t myself. I was facing toward the east. I felt spiritually as I had never felt before. And a man appeared to me, a soldier. It was Ruben Red Feather, who had been killed in action during World War II. He had been dead so long, but here he was. I think he wanted to help me in some way. I saw lightning, and the morning star reflected the lightning to where I stood. It turned into a rainbow, which was like a funnel, funneling the rainbow right into my eyes. And in there I saw a man’s face, with five points sticking out all around like horns. It was a star who spoke to me: “He has seen you. Wowakan, power from the star, he has given you.”

The next morning and afternoon, I stayed in the pit. I no longer felt hunger or thirst. In the middle of the day I saw a gopher’s face. It came out of the altar. When it looked at me I felt that a strange power entered me. The gopher was swinging its tail and sprinkled me with sacred gopher dust. It rained down on me.

On the fourth day, just as the sun was coming up, just when it peeked a little over the horizon, I saw a blinding whiteness reaching all the way up to the sky. And I saw the universe filled up with green and blue, just the colors. Then I saw a man walking a mile
off with a standing-up feather in his hair. He was carrying six sticks, six roots. And he was singing: “From Four Directions, Grandfather will see you. I bring the roots you will use in the Iktomi altar.”

I turned toward the south and prayed. The sun was halfway out when I was given another vision. Right behind me I heard a voice from a spirit, from a hairy spider. An eagle was flying over me. A real eagle, not a dream eagle. I had my eagle bone whistle. I blew it four times in the four directions. Then a black cloud formed over me and water sprinkled down on my head. And the voice said, “The spirit will take care of you. Tunkashila blesses you with the water.” That was all I heard on the fourth day, standing there with the pipe.