by Richard Seifried
Signal Hill Musings
February, 2005
Just as I slipped my undershirt over my head, the sun, then appearing over the far distant, southeastern horizon, struck me with its first glorious rays of light. The time is 7:27 a.m., December 29, 2004.
Now, once again, I am in my office, sipping strong black coffee, watching that same not-so-distant star bathe my aloe plants with life-sustaining radiance.
You Musings readers might be thinking, “Oh, no! Not again. Not the sunrise stuff!”
No matter. I’ll likely write about it again and again because each new day is a miraculous beginning of another of life’s adventures.
I wonder about many things at this hour.
What did my Grandfather think about this sunrise miracle as he stood outside his sod house, way out on the Nebraska plains?
What did the Native Americans think as they watched the same star, rising to its most northern horizontal position to mark the beginning of what we call summer solstice, from their location at the great Medicine Wheel far up in the Bighorn Mountains?
You and I, those of us who are not, sometimes wish that we were Native American, that Native blood flowed through our veins. Times have changed – are still changing. American genocide has ended. We no longer hide our Black or Native American inclusions as part of our family history. For some, it is fashionable to seek such infusions of cultural blood.
For most of us, the lucky ones, that is.
We who welcome such heritages have a desire, sometimes a compulsion, even wishful thinking, to find a bit of red blood in our family tree. We think that it will help us comprehend nature more fully, to experience spiritualism, realizing that there is value in those added attributes known as Native awareness.
Well, my friends, I too would like to have that blood and its characteristics. I am known by Native Americans as a “Wannabe.” In my case Shawnee. But, whether we do have Native blood or not doesn’t really matter.
I, me, in this life, have experienced wonderful awarenesses, like this morning’s sunrise. The misty hills before me. Deer drinking from our water tub. I tell myself that I don’t have to be Native American to appreciate a birdcall, the taste of a wild strawberry, or the mystical notes emanating from a John Two-Hawks’ flute.
Not so very long ago, all of our ancestors were hunter-gatherers – no matter if your heritage is Russian, South African, Anglo Saxon, or Native American. We have all descended from ancestors who hunted, fished, and gathered wild foods.
Back somewhere before the dawn of history, for most of us, our forebearers lived wild, free, dangerous lives in a world of great abundance.
Imagine, our people, wandering across the grasslands of the world, father and older sons scouting ahead, searching for animals whose meat would sustain the family group. Mother and daughters and little ones, collecting roots, fruits, edible green plants to provide most of the family’s nourishment.
Sometimes I sit back and consider this fact and wonder what thoughts went through their minds. Did they sing? Were they gentle with one another? Did they daydream about better times? Not-so-long-ago my people stared at the heavens, marveled at Earth Mother’s beauty, trembled in fear as storms or earthquakes or great carnivores threatened their very existence.
They too, like some of us, experienced unexplainable sights, sounds, feelings, even smells, and in their attempts to comprehend, religion was born.
What undoubtedly sustained our forebearers, and enabled them to survive, was intelligence. More than that, love was there, as it existed in most other animals too. When they moved across the land, they felt and experienced the greatest gift of all, love. Love for family. Love for friends. And, somewhere along the way, love for other creatures, plants, even sunrises like the one that just blessed me.
Some sociologists declare that the reason our society has so many problems is that we are still hunter-gatherers. That genetically, we have not really evolved to the point where we can truly cope with our advancing technology.
Perhaps.
What I am attempting to write is that one doesn’t have to be a Native American to experience, appreciate what the world presents us.
Flute music, a drumbeat, a red-tailed hawk, the wild Columbine, all are for us to absorb, to appreciate, to become enriched with the knowledge and emotion that such experiences give us.
After all, we, you and I are part of this creation too.
