Wailing Wall at Little Big Horn

2/storm
Know the Power that is Peace -Black Elk

Native American Wailing Wall Memorial at the Little Big Horn Battleground

The microclimate of the Badlands and Black Hills became quite obvious as the wide blue sky throughout Wyoming and the great state of Montana opened before us. Black Elk's reference to "greasy grass" at the site of Custer's last stand was puzzling to me and I'm still unsure if this is the same as buffalo grass or sweet grass (as in smudge). I heard this Indian phrase used as a a colloquialism when a trucker cautioned us to drive safely on the greasy roads in SD, definitely a new term for a midwesterner.

Just north of the Wyoming/Montana state line, off I 90 to the right you can see the stretch of land that witnessed this famous battle where 221 troops of General Custer were defeated by the Sioux, the Crow, Cheyanne, even Arapahoe tribes who had banded together to stop this nonsense once and for all. Accounts say the expanse of greasy grass was darkened by all the people and horses that fought there. On the grounds now is a US military war memorial cemetary, (most of Custer's people were buried back East) and an architecturally stunning circle-shaped memorial that honors the four cardinal directions and the Native Americans who died defending their land and culture. (pictured above and below)

Evidently George H. Bush was the President who sanctified this memorial back in 1991 when officially the federal government starting softening their approach under pressure from more conscious citizens. Disturbingly, at the top of the hill, over-looking everything, is the mass horse grave, as Custer and his men circled their horses and shot them, using them as protection from the on-rush of Indians. The contrast in how the Indians and the whites each used the circle and their horses in battle speaks to their vastly different levels of consciousness and why they were destined to conflict.

Rewriting American History - Crazy Horse in the Black Hills

1/Flint

Have spent the last few days learning more about the Native Americans as I travel through the great plains on my way out to the Return of the Ancestors gathering. In my youth I spent some time with the Navajo, Hopi and Apache people on the Arizona reservations. Since that time I've been hearing that steps were being taken, even by our government, to rewrite the bloody chapters in American history with a more balanced perspective, and I've been curious to see how this has manifested. My daughter wanted company driving out to Montana, I had never taken the northern route before (I 90), so I seized this opportunity, packed Black Elk Speaks and Brad Olsen's Sacred Places of North America and hit the road just to see how things may be shifting during this auspicious time in world history.

I can always feel the energy shift to something more spiritual immediately upon crossing the Illinois-Wisconsin state line. It stayed with us as we drove through Western Wisconsin but seemed diffused as we drove across southern MN. This is pig farm central and every version of pork, including the infamous SPAM is processed in these parts (pun intended). Wind farms are everywhere, lazily rotating at uniform speed. Their rhythm is soothing, but the design of the electrical gadgetry they've constructed to pump this power to the grid was ugly, enormous and foreboding. Heaven help us energy hogs.

My overall sense of indigenous presence reappeared around Sioux City, SD, as I admired the red quartzite rock which is found all over the area. We first noticed the color on the interstate, as the pavement turns pink for several miles. While walking Beluci (the dog) we found tons of it, just lying in the weeds next to the hotel. We discovered that red quartz is the centerpiece of Sioux City's central Falls Park, as seen right. The natives knew that this stone held special energy and so blessed their land.



We took our time driving the loop through the Badlands of Western South Dakota even though it was cold and the wet wind bit right through us. The bizarre formations of rock, stone and sand must have embellished some amazing vision quests and intense spiritual experiences in their day. The colors were quite muted by the low clouds and the lack of wildlife on the land where buffalo used to roam made it feel hauntingly empty and tainted. An overlook called "The Ancient Hunters" had a description of the Indian practice of running whole heards of buffalo off the cliff in order to kill them en masse, and I've since noticed numerous signs for "buffalo jumps" all across the great plains East of the Great Divide. Its almost like we're trying to emphasize their savagery to assuage our white guilt.

Way out on the horizon, about where the Pine Ridge reservation is and where the Ghost Dance of Wounded Knee (click this to watch a gutt wrentching video of what happened at Wounded Knee) would have been, some light appeared and dazzled up the sky (its over Ardyce's head, seen on the left). That light spot is also where Black Elk lived at the end of his life and where many potent sundances and ceremonies are held today. Black Elk said that Crazy Horse, perhaps the most pure and traditionally steadfast Native leaders of that time, may be buried near Bear Creek in the Badlands. He said that after the Wasichus (white settlers/perpretators) had tricked and killed him Crazy Horse (they were always unsuccessful at trying to kill him in battle), his parents put him in a box, loaded it on the pony drag and went away towards this holy place. Nobody followed them and no one ever told where they took his body.
The next day we made our way over to the Black Hills where we hoped to spend time at the Crazy Horse Memorial where the essence of this great warrior is gradually being etched, blasted and carved into an enormous stone monument. Another dark, rainy day had us wondering what suckers we were as we paid a $10 entrance fee to the park attendant who assured us that no one had seen Crazy Horse for the past three days due to foul weather. We ended up spending most of the day at this incredibly special attraction and were blessed to have the clouds lift and clear so that we could see this fantastic sculpture in the making.

Insensitive people gripe about how little progress has been made in over 60 years of painstaking effort, but when you realize that this is a privately funded, family project, that is four times bigger than Mt. Rushmore and larger than the largest pyramid at Giza, you realize that this is the kind of project that could only come to fruition in the new world age. The following video clip is an update, describing the $5 million in funding that has been recently infused into the project. These funds will allow two teams to work on the sculpture at the same time for the first time ever. In light of American indigenous prophecies, it is no surprise that this project is gaining momentum at this time.