what you going to do about me?

what you going to do about me?

fiction
Edward w Pritchard

It's a good time to think about the original Americans on thanksgiving evening after we sleep off a too large scrumptious meal and some prepare to go shopping all night to buy Black Friday bargains.

Native Americans are a forgotten group, invisible since the 19th century for the most part. Yet their values and spiritual beliefs gently haunt the philosophies of many of us Americans. Doing with less, minimalism, respecting the earth, recycling and a strong spiritual underpinning to our lives. Spiritual in the everyday observation of the earth's cycles and our place in a grand system of which we are a very small part, a part that quickly passes through the environment we live in.

Complexity characterizes our world. Surrounded by things we seek to find significance in material objects. Material things are not harmful in themselves but they confine the imagination as it is continually necessary to store, insure and repair what we own. We seldom spend time in nature and we ignore the cycles of the earth we inhabit so briefly.

It's been nearly fifty years since Quick Silver Messenger Service sang " What you going to do about Me"?. Have you taken your stand? Tonight as you plan your day for tomorrow think about the original Native Americans and how they would have spent a late November day here in cold snowy Ohio two hundred fifty years ago. Is our lifestyle superior to theirs?

As a start perhaps we could read " Bury my Heart at Wounded Knee" to raise our awareness. Not to feel bad, or shameful but out of respect. Also maybe to learn again about another lifestyle that existed once where we now call home.