Living in Indian Country

 Lately I have been dog sitting to make money. I started doing this after my classes for grad school ended because I didn't want to stay here in NM long term and so I just started taking on odd jobs. A friend of mine from school told me that she was doing it while she was transitioning out of school and into a full time therapist job. I don't want to be a therapist. I just want to go back to the Asheville area and pick up right where I left off before I left for school. So, dog sitting. For now. I have three weeks left here or five weeks depending on whether or not I cancel the last dog sitting gig, which I would like to do. 

There is a lot about the southwest that I love and would like to explore. I want to go up to Colorado and see Mesa Verde. By the way, does anyone else find it totally shocking and horrifying that things like Mesa Verde, a thousands of years old, pre-columbian, well developed and massive cliff dwelling site is not taught about in our school system? I somehow missed it anyways and did not know about its existence until I moved out here. Maybe to other people this is common knowledge. I don't know. 

The more I wake up, the more horrified I am at the existing culture around me. It is not really surprising that Mesa Verde is not talked about in the school system. More and more, I realize that our school system, particularly the subject of history, is one giant gas light. The more I realize the truth, the more beautiful, fascinating and horrifying America seems to me. We, as white people, really don't belong here. It's not our land. I'm not saying we should leave, but we should at least begin by acknowledging that. We need to ask permission to be here. This should be an official government policy. These are things I think about daily. 

I think if there is any reason that makes sense to me that I came out here, it is to wake up to and be in Indian Country. To see and hear that Native people are still here. They are still speaking their languages, they are still practicing their spirituality and living in ways they always were before white people came here. Navajo Nation is the size of Ireland. Did you know that? The size of Ireland! Ireland is a whole country. I've been there. I lived there. Their story is similar to the Native people's here in America. They were dominated and controlled by the English for 900 years. That's way longer than the native people here have been dominated and controlled by us white people. Ireland won her independence and it is not too late for the same thing to happen here in America. This is something I long for and hope for. It's something I pray about. I believe it is the only way for us to heal as a nation. I think that this way of thinking is radical and unheard of and somewhat shocking for mainstream American culture. It certainly was not in my consciousness when I was growing up, but more and more, it seems obvious to me. 

We are the Roman Empire to the Native people and they are the jews. 

I don't know what else to write right now. 

Love,

Suzy.

P.S. I'm not talking about guilt. I'm talking about waking up. The world becomes a much more profound and beautiful place when we are not gas lit. It's the difference between authenticity and the Stepford Wives.