The Fort Hall indian Reservation has the most beautiful dancing ring I have ever seen — it is covered in a lovely, architecturally sweeping structure, strung with shade cloths and planted with thick, lush grass. Around the edge of the dancing area sit fifteen to twenty drumming circles that take turns playing through out the day, dance by dance, spelling history into thin air with soaring voices and rawhide strung tight. I always sit within the circumference of the drum line at this pow wow because I don’t own a lawn chair, for starters, but also because I like to feel it in my chest, you know? Each drum strike. My heart electrically stumbles at first and then rearranges itself rhythmically so that my blood keeps tempo with the swirl of sound, texture and color around me. At times I have to plug my ears, but I can still feel the jolt of the past wearing on my bones, as though it’s me being struck surely and deftly, skin tight and thrumming, two black braids hanging over me and a wide mouth singing the sky down to earth.
Pow wow is transporting.
The best women dancers move with a stoic, controlled face; neither frowning or smiling, mouth and cheeks firm despite the steady movement of feet through green grass. It is grace, refinement, dignity, and power — the way they move. Surefooted as any doe, tied up securely with the sweep of fringe and the jangle of jingles. I can only imagine what it feels like to carry pounds of exquisite hand beading across a pair of narrow shoulders. Would I stumble? Would I fall? Or would I move like the mountain water, too?
The men dance to the drums dynamically, athletically, with strength and virtue. I see it in their mouths; a history of place, a ribbon of leadership, an understanding of seasons, the quiet knowing that comes with bones built of wildflowers and bison heart. Swirling with color, streamers, fringe, feathers; eyes masked in paint, ankles heavy with bells. They are a true marvel. I openly stare.
These are ancient dances that span generations and time. There’s a funny mix of old and new, a pairing of neon synthetics and deer hide, the combination of dancing from the heart and dancing to win. The announcer with the microphone addresses the junior fancy dancers before giving awards and quotes an Iggy Azalea song. Those in the crowd who know the lyrics sing along a little and laugh.
There are the questions that continually hang in my mind after a lifetime of living beside or ON reservations in Canada and the USA:
Where has this culture come from and where is it headed? How does it remain intact and alive under the raw and terrible pressure of the world? What does the future hold for the newest generation? Which of them will be scientists, doctors, farmers, lawyers, artists, musicians? Which of them will spend a decade dealing cards for the blackjack table at the casino down the road? Which of them will lead AA meetings for friends and family? Which of them will have the next beautiful little girl who will learn, slowly and seriously, the steps to the fancy dance to carry herself into a sure future that holds hands with a complicated past?
And what is my part in it all, a white girl, a white artist, who at times wishes she had the right to wear a jingle dress with slim wrists wrapped in petit point turquoise while moving with a stoic face across green grass in the heart of summer.