A Short History of the annual Native American
Alcatraz Island Un-Thanksgiving Sunrise Ceremony
This is a “rough cut”—an excerpt edited out of my novel, Fruit of the Devil, due to the fact that it was deemed too “history heavy” for a fictional read.
It is important that we study history so we don’t repeat our mistakes.
“Total control led to total cruelty. The Spaniards ‘thought nothing of knifing Indians by tens and twenties and of cutting slices off them to test the sharpness of their blades.’ Las Casas tells how ‘two of these so-called Christians met two Indian boys one day, … and for fun beheaded the boys… The cruel policy initiated by Columbus and pursued by his successors resulted in complete genocide.’ When we read the history books given to children in the United States, it all starts with heroic adventure – there is no bloodshed – and Columbus Day is a celebration.”
A People’s History of the United States. Howard Zinn
Thursday, November 24, 1998. Thanksgiving Day. San Francisco Bay.
The American Indian man in full regalia stood on the deck of the Alcatraz Ferry. He held a small hand drum, which he beat as he sang quietly in a native language. It was pitch dark, 4:30 am out on the San Francisco Bay. The man wore only a skin loincloth, feathers and bells, even though—with the wind chill blowing over the water—the temperature was well below 30ºF.
A raven-haired woman with three eagle feathers sticking straight up from the crown of her head pulled her blanket tight around her shoulders. Her deer skin boots made no sound as she stepped up to the railing next to the man in the feathered headdress. She joined him in song. Her voice, ululating many octaves above the man’s, rose above the drone of the boat engines and cut through the fog.
Most of the other people leaning into the wind and salt spray out on the darkened deck wore heavy clothes—thick jackets, hats and gloves. They sipped from paper cups full of hot liquid, and silently stared over the rails. Reflected night lights from San Francisco and the Golden Gate Bridge rippled over black water.
Aurora shivered, turned, and went back inside the warm and well-lit cabin. She blinked as she realized she could barely remember anything about her two and a half hour drive up the coast. She’d left Santa Cruz at 2:30 am. She shuddered at the thought of driving half-asleep around those sharp, narrow curves in the dark; twisting around steep, shear cliffs high above the rocky, wave-battered coast.
Still brain-fogged from lack of sleep, Aurora gazed around the crowded cabin. No place to sit. People of all ages, descriptions, and skin tones sat and stood shoulder to shoulder—mostly, apparently of Native American heritage.
They wore hats, sweatshirts, and jackets with tribal insignia. Some were in traditional clothing, what they might have worn prior to the European invasion two hundred or more years ago. Several women cradled their babies on papoose boards, made of pine and willow, and lined with cattail down.
There were so many men with black braids and cinnamon colored skin here that Aurora’s heart gave up leaping to her throat every time she thought she spotted him. She had no idea if he was going to be here. Even if he were here, chances of her running into him were small. She took another sip of hot, sweet coffee from her thermos.
Several groups carried banners proclaiming their tribe and place of origin. People had come from all over the Americas: Oklahoma American Indian Movement. North Bay Native Americans. Pitt River and Wintu Nations. Wounded Knee Veterans. Dry Creek Pomo Dancers. Shoshone. Apache. Cherokee. Hopi. Native Hawaiian Sovereignty Movement. Pachamama Alliance of Indigenous Peoples of the Amazon Rainforest. Azteca. Ojibwe. Blackfeet. Oglala Lakota Nation. Ohlone. At least two other ferries were carrying similar groups across the Bay toward Alcatraz Island this morning.
The faces surrounding Aurora were somber and reflective. No one tried to speak over the hum of the boat’s engine.
Aurora’s sleepy thoughts churned up a recent memory.
* * * * *
Friday afternoon, September 10, 1998. Prudenciana Elementary School.
Ryan and Steven stood at Aurora’s shoulder, bloody noses dripping on their shoes. Seated at her advanced math center, Aurora wrote bathroom passes while her math group waited patiently. An eraser went flying by her ear.
My kids are falling apart. Deciding to go ahead with the math centers that got bumped for this morning’s mandatory pro- pesticide assembly: bad choice. I should have stuck with our usual after-lunch reading routine.
“Give me all your blocks, now!” Rico stood on his desk, red hat on backwards, and waved a sword constructed of plastic snap-together blocks at the other students in his math group.
From behind her came a loud crash. Aurora swung around to see a tower of wooden base-ten blocks tumble to the floor in the Long-Toed Salamander group.
Taking a deep calming breath, she sent the bloody noses to the bathroom with extra tissues.
At that moment, Alice, who the office had sent back to class after the assembly, threw up all over her desk, herself, and the floor. Action stopped; everyone stared.
The odor of vomit oozed around the room. Alice started crying.
Aurora went to the intercom to ask Bushi, the school secretary, to contact the custodian. She was standing with the intercom handset to her ear when the principal opened the door.
Principal Wagner’s lips were thin and tight. Her nostrils flared in disgust as she stood at the door taking in the scene.
“Ms. Bourne, step outside with me a moment.”
Aurora shot Rico a look. He took off his hat, jumped off his desk, and began picking up the toppled wooden blocks. Other students followed suit. Aurora slipped out and closed the door behind her.
Principal Wagner glared.
“Ms. Bourne, Mr. King has been in my office for the past hour, complaining about you. It seems that last year, when his son was in your class, you portrayed Christopher Columbus as a blood-thirsty conqueror who stole from the Indians, enslaved, tortured, and killed them. That is a terrible story to tell children.”
Aurora kept her face in neutral and suppressed the impulse to defend herself. The Project Interact Social Studies simulation she’d used for that lesson was an exemplary experiential learning curriculum aligned with the goals, objectives, and best practices of the California Social Studies Standards. After prearranging with one of her students, she’d pretended to sail around the classroom on Columbus Day and land at the student’s desk, where she’d proceeded to unpack and claim the student’s belongings, exclaiming about all the wonderful things she’d discovered.
The class had expressed outrage. “You didn’t discover that stuff! It belongs to Leanne!”
The students’ response had led to an excellent, academically rigorous discussion about Columbus and colonization. But Aurora knew there was no point in trying to explain all this to the principal.
“Mr. King was taught that Columbus is a hero,” said Principal Wagner. “He feels that elementary school children are too young to hear otherwise. You have his daughter Lizzie in your class this year and Mr. King wants to be sure she is taught the nice, inspiring Columbus story he learned as a boy.”
Niño, the custodian, arrived with a bucket of industrial-strength sudsy water, a mop, and a can of sawdust. The chemical smell of the water made Aurora’s eyes tear and her throat constrict. Niño threw open the classroom door and pushed his bucket inside.
Alice returned from the office wearing fresh clothes from Bushi’s emergency box, with a note from Bushi stating there was no one at home who could pick her up early, so Alice would be staying until the end of the day. Aurora ushered her into the classroom.
“I don’t want the Kings in my office about this Columbus business again this year,” said Principal Wagner.
Aurora stared out across the school playground to the strawberry field on the other side of the cyclone fence. A sea of plastic tarp covering the recently fumigated ground shimmered in the sun.
Niño emerged, pulling his bucket of toxic pink cleaning fluid. He wheeled it to the storm drain in front of Aurora’s classroom and dumped it.
Open-mouthed and wide-eyed, Aurora turned to the principal. Isn’t she going to say something to the custodian about dumping toxic chemicals down the storm drain? That storm drain flows to the bay, to the National Marine Sanctuary!
“You may go back to your class now,” said the principal Wagner. “Remember to watch what you say about Columbus.”
Aurora reentered her classroom feeling numb. Her students had put away all the math manipulatives perfectly. They sat in their seats with library books out, engaged in sustained silent reading, their usual after lunch “Drop Everything and Read” activity.
“Oh, what a wonderful class you are!” she said. “I think you must be the best class I’ve ever had. I’m so lucky and honored to be your teacher.”
All the children stretched straighter in their seats, and held their books with even more commitment.
Aurora glanced at her watch. “Tell you what. Today’s schedule has been pretty discombobulated. Raise your hand if you’d still like to have a few minutes of our usual Teacher Read Aloud before we go out to P.E.”
Every student’s hand went up. Aurora reached for the book on her desk and held it so everyone could see its exquisitely illustrated cover: a watercolor of a lovely grey-haired woman kneeling on a wild coastal hillside, planting lupines.
“Miss Rumphius, by Barbara Cooney,” Aurora began. “This is a story about Alice Rumphius. When she’s young, she tells Grandpa that when she’s grown, she wants to travel to faraway places and then settle down in a cottage by the sea. ‘That is all well and good,’ said Grandfather. ‘But there is one more thing you must do. You must find a way to help make the world more beautiful.’”
Aurora studied the rapt faces of her students. “Please turn to the person next to you,” she said, “and tell them what you think Miss Rumphius might do to help make the world more beautiful.”
When her students had finished sharing she asked, “Now, what will you do to help make the world more beautiful?”
Hands flew up. “Yes, Melody?”
“I’m coming to the beach clean-up this weekend!”
* * * * *
Suddenly, six men seated around a very large drum raised deerskin-covered sticks and struck the taut skin.
Boom Boom Boom drowned out all other sounds in the cabin, making Aurora’s teeth rattle, and resonating inside her head as if she and everyone else in the boat were inside a giant heart. The drummers began to sing. Yah te heh. Weh ah weehh ahhh. Weh weh ah. Yah weh ahy ah hey ya he eh eh hey o. Aurora had never heard a native drum circle before. It was an eerie sound.
When the Alcatraz Flyer landed on the rock island in the middle of San Francisco Bay, uniformed National Park Rangers guided passengers down the dark gangplank to the dank and somber gathering place at the base of the historic fortress penitentiary.
People milled around quietly as the other ferries disembarked. Floodlights poured over the crowd, making a small pool of light in the vast night. Umbral figures cast shadows like long black prison bars across the pavement. Faces and hands shone in dramatic chiaroscuro.
Several Indians holding bundles of smoking sage circulated through the crowd smudging people. Aurora gratefully reached for the curling blue smoke when it came to her. With both hands she wafted it over herself, head to toe, front and back, praying to be cleansed and purified of all negativity and wrongdoing she may have ever caused or accumulated, and praying for the healing and well being of all.
“Good morning.” All faces turned toward the woman holding a microphone. Marie Christine, Indian Canyon Tribal Leader, had invited Aurora to this twenty-ninth annual Indigenous People’s Thanksgiving Sunrise Ceremony, called, by some, un-Thanksgiving.
“Good morning.” Marie Christine repeated. As beautiful and stately as a queen, with her silver -streaked hair pulled back in a bun at the nape of her neck and her blanket coat, woven with native patterns, draped over her shoulders, her amplified voice focused the crowd. “On behalf of the Muwekma Ohlone, welcome to Ohlone Territory.”
Challenge and rebellion sang through that simple statement. Some in the crowd laughed nervously, some defiantly. “A-ho!” rang out from many voices.
“Thank you for being here. Thank you for getting up early to join us. Trust that you are here because you were called and you had the courage to answer the call. Native or non-native, we need you. We need all of us at this time. We need to come together, with our whole hearts, minds, and spirits to do this work, to decide what kind of future life we want for our children, and to help Great Spirit make it so.
“Before we all go on up to gather around the fire for the Sunrise Ceremony, we ask you to take a few minutes to purify your thoughts and set your intentions for the spiritual work we have ahead of us this morning. For the non-Indians here, if think you’ve come to ‘fix’ us, you are wasting your time. But if you know that your liberation—in fact, the very continuation of your existence here on Turtle Island—is bound up with ours, then welcome, and let us work together, respectfully, as equals.
“We’ve gathered here in this place we call ‘Turtle Island’—called ‘The Rock’ by some—a place that has become a symbol of Resistance and Self-Determination, Autonomy and Self-Respect for Indigenous Peoples, a symbol of struggle and hope.
“‘The Rock’, as most of you probably know, was for many years a federal penitentiary. The prison here closed in 1963. At that time, Indians began petitioning the US government to return the island to its rightful owners, to designate the island as Indian lands. That didn’t happen.”
Soft, bitter laughter rippled around the crowd.
“Finally, in 1969, a group of ‘Indians of All Tribes’ calling themselves the Red Power Movement took over. They occupied the island. They were led by Mohawk Richard Oakes; SFSU student activists; Grace Thorpe, the daughter of Olympic great Jim Thorpe; and Tuscarora medicine man Mad Bear Anderson. During the occupation, many others came to participate, including American Indian Movement leaders Dennis Banks, Russell Means, and Clyde Bellecourt, and the first female principal chief of the Cherokee Nation, Wilma Mankiller. Some of the veterans of that occupation are here this morning.”
A few war whoops rang out.
“The ‘Indians of all Tribes’ issued a proclamation to the ‘Great White Father’, reclaiming the island and stating that it would be fitting and symbolic that ships from all over the world, entering the Golden Gate, would first see Indian land, and thus be reminded of the true history of this nation. This tiny island would be a symbol of the great lands once ruled by free and noble Indians.
“The proclamation further stated that the island would be suitable for an Indian Reservation, as determined by the white man’s own standard, because: It is isolated from modern facilities, and without adequate means of transportation; it has no fresh running water; it has inadequate sanitation facilities; there are no oil or mineral resources; there is no industry, and so unemployment is very great; there are no health care facilities; the soil is rocky and unproductive and the land does not support game; there are no educational facilities; the population has always exceeded the land base; and the population has always been held as prisoners and kept dependent upon others.”
People nodded their heads. There was some ironic laughter and a murmur of grumbled comments. But most people simply listened stoically.
“The Alcatraz occupation ended in 1971, but we have returned every Thanksgiving Day since then, to remember. We join in solidarity with our brothers and sisters on the other side of the country in Plymouth, Massachusetts today, who are holding their annual Native American Day of Protest and National Day of Mourning. We are here to pray for all our relations who have died under the oppression of colonial America, and those murdered through genocide everywhere. We pray for healing, strength and unity as we remember the past and think about our future. We invite you to join with us and help to dispel the myths, lies and misconceptions of the distorted history taught to our children.”
Drums beat and voices wailed.
Aurora suppressed a groan of self-recrimination. She had not mentioned Columbus once in school this year. She’d been officially gaged, but that was no excuse. Next year, she vowed to herself that she would have the courage to speak the truth. Next year, she would definitely watch what she said about Columbus, oh yes. And she would have quite a lot to say.
“Hey-Oh-Oh-Ha-Na ey at ta eh ey ye,” sang the drummers. Green uniformed National Park Rangers and Native American monitors with red armbands began ushering people forward.
Aurora flowed with the throng as it moved through a long, narrow tunnel. Artifacts of the prison, now an historic monument, were evident along the tunnel walls. Spooky. Aurora shivered and told herself not to be afraid.
In the shoulder-to-shoulder jostling, two men with shaved heads and sandaled feet stepped beside her. They wore yellow-orange robes like the Dali Lama.
Aurora donned her most sanctimoniously Buddhist frame of mind, as if wrapping herself up in a saffron shawl. Her mind began spinning the wheels of karma and she silently chanted Sadhana. May I be free of fear, may all beings be free of fear, may I be free of suffering, may all beings be free of suffering, may I be happy, may all beings be happy, may I be fed, may all beings be fed… Omm ma ni pad me hum
She suspected that the monks walking next to her could read her mind, could see into her heart. She hoped she was being suitably spiritual and non-attached, sufficiently filled with humility and compassion. Surreptitiously, she snuck a peak at the men in orange robes, with their round shaved heads and round ageless faces. They could be Asian, she thought, maybe Tibetan or Mongolian.
The monk at her left shoulder looked her straight in the eye. “Packed like sardines, aren’t we? Hey, Charlie, pass the mustard. Whose got some onion?” He winked.
Aurora’s jaw dropped. She had never heard such a thick Brooklyn accent before in her life, except in the movies.
“How do you do? Name’s Morris. Morris Guildenstein. From Brooklyn. Shalom. Pleased ta meet ya.” He held out his hand. “And you, my dear?”
Aurora shook Morris’ hand and introduced herself. “Are you really from Brooklyn?” she asked.
“What? You think I learned to talk like this in Outer Mongolia? Let me tell you a little about myself while we walk this long tunnel, with the suffering prison ghosts. So, I was strolling by an exclusive hotel that had a beautiful garden, and a sign that said, Private No Trespass. Of course, I went into the garden, to smell the roses. A security guard came up to me and said, ‘Wha’s a matta? Can’t you read? The sign says, Private. No trespass.’ ‘Oh, yeah, I can read, all right,’ I says. ‘Sheesh! Ya think I’m a yutz? I just read it differently than you. Ya see, I thought it said, Private? Nooo! Trespass.’ ”
Aurora laughed outloud. The man had a comedic delivery that rivaled Groucho Marx.
“I bet you’ve never met a Jewish Buddhist monk before, huh?”
“No. How did you, I mean… Are you really a monk?”
“Yes, it’s true. As a young man, in the sixties, I came out to California and discovered Buddhism. I realized right away that I had to become a monk. I met my friend Narayan, here, way back then, when we were both novitiates at the monastery in San Francisco. Narayan’s from Japan. We’re both Veteran’s of the Longest Walk.”
Narayan nodded to Aurora.
“What’s the Longest Walk?”
“It was in 1978. Several thousand Indians and non-Indian supporters walked 3,200 miles across the country. Ted Kennedy, Marlon Brando, Muhammad Ali, many celebrities joined us. We started with a Sacred Pipe ceremony in Alcatraz and walked all the way to the Washington Monument, in Washington, DC. Traditional indigenous spiritual leaders and spiritual leaders of many faiths from around the world participated. We even had Maori tribal leaders with us. Oy, what a parade. You should have been there. We marched to bring public attention to eleven pieces of proposed anti-Indian legislation, dealing with American Indian political prisoners, forced relocation at Big Mountain, water rights, abrogation of treaties, and threats to tribal sovereignty. The week we were in DC, Congress passed the American Indian Religious Freedom Act. That was twenty years ago. Narayan and I have been coming back to Alcatraz to join in the Thanksgiving Sunrise Ceremony ever since.”
“This is my first one,” said Aurora.
“It’s good you came today,” said Morris, patting Aurora on the shoulder. “Narayan and I almost didn’t make it this time. We just got back from a two-week interfaith peace delegation on the Israeli Palestinian border. We were staying in the home of a Palestinian family. The last afternoon of the delegation, I went out for a walk. Suddenly, I realized something very dangerous was chasing me. I looked over my shoulder and saw a tiger, just about to pounce. I started running and, you’ll never believe what happened. I came to a huge cliff, a precipice. Well, with the jaws of the tiger about to close on my ankle, of course, I jumped. Lo and behold, there was a small branch sticking out of the side of the cliff. I grabbed ahold and was dangling there, the tiger just above me but unable to reach me. Then I noticed a mouse, nibbling away at my branch. I realized that soon, I would fall to the rocks far below. Right then, I spotted the most beautiful, red ripe wild strawberry I ever saw, just within my reach. I looked up at the tiger, and at the mouse chewing on my branch, reached out, picked that strawberry, and ate it. Oy! It was the best thing I have ever tasted.” Morris adjusted the orange robe draped over his shoulder, and winked at Aurora.
The tunnel opened onto a curving path that led up a hill. The throng surged and spread out as it exited the tunnel, and Aurora lost track of the monks. Just ahead of her, she caught a glimpse of a shining blue-black braid. Her heart skipped. She forgot to breathe. Stop it, you imbecile. The black braid disappeared in the crowd. It wasn’t him. Get over it.
The path ended at the top of the hill, leading onto a large flat open space. Below was the bay. Beyond, simmered the misty, ghost grey skyline of San Francisco. People were gathering in an enormous, pulsing circle around a blazing bonfire. All those over fifty years old—Indian and non-Indian—were honored as elders and respectfully invited to sit in chairs forming the inner ring of the circle. Aurora stood, with a good view of the fire, the cityscape, and the eastern horizon. The horizon was just beginning to glow.
Floyd Red Crow Westerman, cultural representative and ambassador for the International Indian Treaty Council and the American Indian Movement, stood at the edge of the bonfire and held a microphone.
“Those who started the National Day of Mourning in 1970 spoke of terrible racism and poverty. We all know that racism is still alive; our people are still mired in deep poverty; we still lack health care, education, and housing. Every winter too many of our people have to make the desperate choice between heating and eating. Our youth suicide and school dropout rates and our rate of alcoholism continue to be the highest in the nation, and these conditions are only worsening. We mourn the loss of our ancestors and the devastation of our beautiful Mother Earth. I hope you will join me in praying for our sisters and brothers in all countries, the hundreds of millions of people who are hungry today, and human beings everywhere who are referred to as ‘collateral damage.’ Since the invasion of Columbus, native peoples on this land have been non-stop victims of terrorism. We condemn all acts of violence and terror perpetrated by governments and corporations against people worldwide. My niece, Mary Red Crow, is going to tell you a story now.” Floyd Red Crow handed the microphone to a beautiful young woman in a deerskin dress, with long black hair.
“We think it’s time that people know the real story of Thanksgiving,” said the woman. “The first official day of Thanksgiving was proclaimed by Governor Winthrop in 1637. The feast was a celebration of the safe return of men from Massachusetts who had gone to a place near Mystic, Connecticut and participated in the massacre of over seven hundred Pequot men, women, and children. In the predawn hours on the day of their annual green corn festival, Pequot village men were clubbed to death and the women and children burned alive in their huts.
“Following that first Thanksgiving celebration of a successful massacre, a frenzy of massacres followed, with days of Thanksgiving feasts being held after each successful massacre. During the feasting, hacked off heads of native people were kicked through the streets of New England towns like soccer balls, and heads were impaled on poles. George Washington finally suggested that only one day of Thanksgiving per year be set aside, instead of celebrating each and every massacre of Indians. Later, during the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln decreed Thanksgiving Day to be a legal national holiday, on the same day he ordered troops to march against the starving Sioux in Minnesota.”
The woman handed the mike back to Red Crow.
“We need to learn our true history so it won’t ever be repeated. About the only true thing in the American mythology of Thanksgiving Day is that these pitiful European strangers would not have survived their first several years in New England were it not for the generosity and aid of my people. And what these native people got in return was genocide, theft of their land, and never ending repression.
“The ‘Pilgrims’ did not really even call themselves pilgrims, and they did not come here seeking religious freedom. They already had that in Holland. They came here as part of a commercial venture. The Mayflower Compact was nothing more than a bunch of white men coming to an agreement that ensured they would get maximum return on investment. The so-called Pilgrims introduced sexism, racism, bigotry, prisons, and the class system to these shores.”
A fierce-looking woman with black lines tattooed under her nose, over her lips and down her chin stepped up to speak. She wore an upside-down basket on her head.
“We don’t stand alone. We are not an insignificant minority yearning to be democrats or republicans. We represent a very basic foundation of the human rights struggle of the almost six billion people around the world. We are the Indigenous Movement. Somos Indiginistas. We represent our Mother Earth, not the corporate interests. Our human rights are based on the protection of Mother Earth. Not on the exploitation of resources. Not on mining. Not on the institutionalization of racism. So these are the things we work for on behalf of the International Indian Treaty Council. Human rights. An even more importantly, the rights of Mother Earth.”
A shout went up. Ululating cries and war whoops. Clackers, rattles and drums beat against the dark looming over the bay. Several native groups danced and sang as the sky gradually lightened. A native woman with a straight back and long white hair took the microphone. The bonfire blazed and crackled.
“Soon Grandfather Sun is going to be coming over the horizon, giving us the blessing of those first rays of light, the most powerful moment of the day. At this time, people are going to be coming around and passing out tobacco. Just hold the tobacco in your hands and hold your prayers in your head and heart until the sun rises. At that time, we will ask you to stand and join us in a prayer facing in turn toward each of the directions: North, South, East and West, then above and below. After that, you will be invited to offer your tobacco and your prayers to the fire.”
An old man with a fringe of colored ribbons on his shirt stepped up beside the white-haired woman. He spoke. “The word Indios, which later became ‘Indians’, means ‘in God’. That’s what Columbus called us. People truly living En Díos, in God. We were not named after India. That is not correct. That place, India, was called Hinduistan in Columbus’ time. That pirate Columbus, he was looking for a place in Asia, but he found us. And he called us In-Díos, a name we still call ourselves, even though we know we are from many many different nations, each with our own names. We are separate Nations. But the group of us—all of us—we still use that name, Indians, because he said we lived en Díos, in God, and we know that is true. Columbus also said about us, ‘They are so peaceful and generous, with fifty men we could enslave them completely.’”
Aurora felt someone touch her, and she turned to find a little girl offering tobacco from a beautiful Indian basket. Aurora, smiled, took a pinch, and held it in her hand, over her heart.
“The lust and greed that has always come from the Europeans drove Columbus and his men to unspeakable acts,” the old man continued. “They slaughtered the Arokok people on that original island. The Arokok population was reduced from 50,000 to 5,000 in fifty years, all for gold. That gold is still being lusted after. And the oil, and the coal, and the minerals, and even the air and water. And our Mother Earth needs our help for that reason.
“We are the descendants of those In-Díos. We know the importance of keeping the old ways alive. This morning, right now at this moment, we have the sacred fire. We still have our language, and our dances. We have our prayers that were handed down by those ancestors, the few who survived unspeakable acts of violence. Columbus ordered their hands cut off if they didn’t bring him enough gold. He ordered thirteen of them hanged every day, because they didn’t bring him as much gold as he wanted. Thirteen, Columbus said, for the disciples and Jesus, who I know in my heart didn’t support that. It wasn’t Jesus’ fault, we know that, even though Columbus claimed he killed us in the name of Christianity.”
“We’re here today to recognize that survivor instinct and the will that kept our ancestors alive,” said the basket hat woman with the traditional tattoos on her face. “We’re here to recognize that spirit, handed down to us, here in the middle of this urban place, this beautiful bay, here in the middle of this place which was also the scene of so much suffering and so much imprisonment of our people and other peoples. We are here today to say we continue to survive. We continue to resist. We honor with all of our hearts and all of our spirits those that stood up not only to fight but to stay true to who they were. To stay as those peoples, who lived in Díos, with the Creator. And that was what was passed down to us, as well the will to survive.”
The white-haired woman spoke again.
“Our Mother Earth needs our help now. We’re talking about the impacts of climate change. Species—animals, bears, elephants, even plants are going extinct because of the actions of humanity. The water, the fish, the winged ones, and the four-footed ones, the trees—all of Mother Earth’s children, here with us today. They need our help. Let’s think about how to do that, so they can survive and so our grandchildren can continue to survive—just as those who went before us did what they needed to do so we could survive and be here today, and still be who we are and still have the spirit, still have the fire and still have our prayers.
“Let’s each of us think what we can do, as we put our tobacco in the fire. Let’s make that commitment brothers and sisters. A commitment to honor and deeply respect all peoples and all cultures, all beings who share this One Planet. A Ho. Noso’n.”
The people stood and prayed to the four corners, and to Father Sky and Mother Earth, with arms and faces uplifted.
The sun rose fire yellow gold over the bay. Aurora went to the crackling, blazing flames in the center of the circle. She had tears in her eyes, and not from the smoke. She threw her tobacco into the fire, and watched with awe as spirit animals leapt and flew out of the flames—cougars, bears, eagles, dolphins, whales, and salmon. She made her commitment.
From across the fire, he smiled at her.