Wellbriety Journey for Forgiveness
Leech Lake Indian School
Cass Lake, MN, June 12, 2009
Opening Up at the Leech Lake Gathering
Opening Ceremony at Leech Lake What effect did the Leech Lake gathering have on the community? Co-coordinator Nancy Kingbird thought about it. “Our gathering went well. It opened up something real reluctant in the community,” she said. “It is time for this to be out in the open in the community, to be discussed. The people are ready for it. Our people have suffered so much they are ready to be real and to talk about these things, to find a safe place and share these things.”
The Leech Lake Indian Reservation in north central Minnesota is the second largest in the state. Its beautiful land encompasses 972 square miles of forests and lakes even though tribal members own only a small percentage of this land. It is not unusual for tribes to own very little of their own reservations. This is an outcome of the 1887 Dawes Act (Allotment Act) still alive to this day, and to some extent the Nelson Act of 1889 in Minnesota. The Indian Mission School at Cass Lake was opened in November of 1867 with a class of 50 students. According to Ms. Kingbird, many of the ancestors of the Leech Lake Nation were also shipped to other Minnesota and out-of-state boarding schools.
Robbie talks about his breakthrough
with the Red Road to Wellbriety book. Robbie shared his own recovery and healing story with us during the day. Holding up a copy of the White Bison book The Red Road to Wellbriety, he revealed that he was in treatment for meth and coke in 2003 when he met up with this book. Robbie didn’t know about his culture and traditions. His non-Native counselor gave him the Red Road to Wellbriety book to read. It turned out that she knew more about his culture and tradition than he did, something that humbled him very much. He told us he started to read the book and it was fascinating. He was able to relate because it was written in terms he could understand and use. The Red Road to Wellbriety saved his life he said. He never thought he would even have a day of sobriety but here he is by the Creator’s will.
About 75 people took part in the Forgiveness Journey gathering at Leech Lake. Meeka, a young lady who also takes part in the White Bison Daughters of Tradition program carried in Brandy Jo. The Sacred Hoop was brought in by Theresa Jordan, Ray Littlewolf, Brady Fairbanks and Levonne Thompson. Deverey Fairbanks, co-coordinator along with Nancy Kingbird, MC’d the event. And the Wednesday Night Singers drummed us through the day. The Wednesday Night singers are part of a group of 40-50 young people from all over the reservation facilitated by Darryl Northbird. Today’s contingent included Darryl Northbird, Alan Hardy, Pete Phonseya and Lynal Fairbanks and others.
Deonne Pansch gives a talk
during the morning. The day opened with Don Coyhis’ popular boarding school presentation followed by another keynote by Deonne Pansch, a therapist and Program manager for the Leech Lake Child Welfare Program. Ms. Pansch talked about American Indian U.S. policy history, the historic background of how the boarding schools came about. Then she went further to talk from her own field of expertise about secondary trauma, those many spin-off afflictions that people have suffered from but have their roots in boarding school causes and behavior. She talked about physical brain injury trauma arising from fetal alcohol effects that gets passed on from generation to generation.
“As a result of boarding schools there is a break in parenting tradition and support,” she says. “A lot of boarding school survivors didn’t have the traditional upbringing and the parenting or family structure or attachment structure that they needed. As a result, many developed secondary disabilities such as mental health issues and substance abuse issues.” These co-occurring disorders are found throughout Indian communities but their roots are in the historic trauma of the past.
Father Harold Eagle Bull What did Ms. Pansch think of the day? “It was powerful, powerful,” she exclaims.” “I had staff within my program who said it was cleansing and powerful. They believed there was an opening in the sky. Someone said to me that there had been clouds covering the open sky but now there had been an opening.”
We were also fortunate to have Father Harold Eagle Bull with us for the day. Father Eagle Bull is a Native American Episcopal priest who works in human services, mental health and social work. He is also a member of the White Bison Board of Directors. Father Harold connected with White Bison while he was with the Episcopal Mission on the Wind River Reservation in Wyoming. He was at Wind River for three-and-a-half years and has been at Leech Lake for seven years.
Father Eagle Bull had a life-changing breakthrough from a lecture by his auntie when he was young. After a binge, he was sent down to his Auntie’s house on the Pine Ridge Reservation. “Sit here, I want to talk to you,” she told him. He respected the Elders. She told him, “If you continue this you will wind up in prison. Do you want that to happen to you?” Through God’s grace, the words got through to him. He went on to school. After that he attend seminary in New Brighton, MN and was ordained. He reflects on the messages of forgiveness and knowing the history carried by the Journey. “I think talking about our boarding school experiences is long overdue. I think the people are ready to go through the grief,” he says.
The Wednesday Drum Robbie remembers a little bit of how that harm was actually passed down. After speaking about his own substance abuse recovery he said, “My mother and her sister were sitting at the table speaking fluent Ojibwe one day. When the kids came in, then they spoke English.” He never understood it because to him the language is the most beautiful thing he has ever heard. He asked about it, but never received a straight answer. They would tell him to go play, they didn’t want to talk about it. He now knows why. Personally, he says, the boarding school did more damage than any other tactic. It took all the nurturing years away, the years where mothers would be prepared for child rearing.
Co-coordinator Nancy Kingbird (left) Another participant relates that she doesn’t remember feeling much kindness from others during her entire growing up. She was never hugged or kissed and finally had to come to understand the lake was her mother in order to survive. She remembers that her only desire was that this didn’t happen to anyone else. She said, “If I can be kind to one other child, I really have made it back.”
The day ended with the Healing Ceremony where people come up individually to the Sacred Hoop to offer tobacco, to pray and to be with their Creator in silence even as the Drum sings its healing songs. Nancy Kingbird reflects on the meaning of the day for her.
“The search in my life is why have we become so self-destructive?” she asks. “It is amazing where we are at with White Bison, with the Wellbriety Movement, and what will happen in Washington at the end of this Journey in a few days. I think of all of that pain and suffering, the no-talking and no-sharing and no-trust and all those core values of our society that were violated. For me it is very, very awakening. It is re-affirming for me to know that the conclusions that I have reached for myself are the same as those White Bison is talking about,” she says quietly.
For more information about the Red Road to Wellbriety Book go to coyhispublishing.com.
The Healing Ceremony during the closing ~ Forgiveness Journey Team
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