"We Indians know about silence.

Tuesday, March 06, 2001

"We Indians know about silence. We aren’t afraid of it. In fact, to us it is more powerful than words." – Dan from "Neither Wolf nor Dog"

In my last column I mentioned Dwight Ault’s letter to the editor in the Star Tribune about producing safe meat. I called him to say how much I enjoyed his letter.

As I mentioned before, Ault might be considered a "dissident" farmer, at least in the way farming is today. He farrows his pigs and the number of pigs he raises are manageable unlike the corporate pigs raised in corporate packing barns.

Soon our talk shifted to the Thursday book club we attend at St. Olaf Church. "Neither Wolf nor Dog," by Kent Neburn, was a book Ault thought would be a good read for the group – the life story of "Dan" a Lakota Indian.

"It might offend some." Ault added.

"Good," was my response. I like to see people nudged out of their comfort zone.

After hanging up, I called the library. Within the hour I was reading the book, setting other planned reading aside.

Dan, the old Indian says, "Our elders were schooled in the ways of silence, and they passed that a long to us. Watch, listen, and then act, they told us. This is the way to live."

"Watch the animals to see how they care for their young. Watch the elders to see how they behave. Watch the white man to see what he wants. Always watch first, with a still heart and mind, then you will learn. When you have watched enough, then you can act."

Later he asks Neburn, the author, what he sees when he looks around Dan’s desolate habitat.

The author points out the abandoned cars.

"That’s what all white people see. You drive through our reservations and say, ‘Look at all the junk cars and all the trash? What do you think we say when we drive through one of your cities?’"

"We can say the same thing. Just because you have everything scrubbed down and in order doesn’t mean anything. What is bigger trash, a junk car or a parking ramp? We can tow the junk car away. The parking ramp has to be torn down with a bulldozer and wrecking cranes… When you don’t need a building anymore, or it is too expensive to fix, then it is trash. To us it looks like trash all the time."

Two weeks ago I was looking at "Lila – Inquiry into Morals" by Robert Perzig, the author of "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance," where Perzig concludes: the Indian way of life, ‘the way’ we did our best to rid, is really the moral way. At the end he quotes Fanz Boas who wrote: "The Dakota Indian considers goodness to be a noun rather than an adjective." And Perzigs altar character concludes this is it, "Good is a noun."

Grover, a younger friend of Dan’s in the Wolf book, leery of sharing anything with the author, tells him early in the book, "Most of you white people don’t even know what it is you want. But you want something, and you’re using us to get it."

It’s one of those books you want to last forever.

Last week was a good week for books. Bud Higgins stopped by from Plunkett Higgins Books with a couple books to look at, incidentally, their book shop is a wonderful place to spend time and find good reading at an affordable price.

He dropped off "The Turn of the Screw" by Henry James, "one of the best," according to Higgins, and "Alone with the Devil," famous cases of a courtroom psychiatrist.

Leaving, he reminded me of what Oliver Wendell Holmes said, "You don’t go to courts for justice. You go there for the law."

It was a kick to attend Pat Piper’s "roast" at the Holiday Inn. Marv Wangen, former long-time Albert Lea mayor, did a wonderful job as master of ceremonies. The warm, amusing stories shared on Piper’s long history in the house and senate brought smiles to all and some tears. Pat said she would like to go back – if it wasn’t so far away – to run a day care center in the senate. Then too, in her spare time, help the custodial staff remove those black skid marks that gather on the floor.

Tim Penny, who after giving Piper an assortment of gifts, totaling less than $10, credited her with one of the clearest explanations of the difference between a Democrat and a Republican – Democrats do what they can to help those less fortunate and Republicans "worry about people who can take care of themselves."

I got home too late for the president’s State of the Union speech but watched a few minutes of a rebroadcast. I turned it off when his beady little eyes got to me.

I did hear him say, "I care so much about education that I married a teacher."

It seems obvious to me he hasn’t learned a great deal from her either.