I was President of NASA

I have to write about something that occasionally creeps up from the depths of my brain and annoys the hell out of me. Everytime I think about this I get angry. It is one hour I wish I could go back and redo. It's going to be a bit long-winded, but I just want to get it off my chest and hopefully expel some of the anger I carry around about this.

In 1996-1997, I was in my fifth and final year at Ball State University. The previous year, I had attended a few meetings for the Native American Student Association. They were a very small group. After attending only a few meetings, they elected me as president for the following year. I was surprised and excited that I would be leading this group, even if it were a small one. We were one of four groups in the House of Multicultural Affairs. The other three were the Asian American group, Black Student Association, and Latino student group. They all had fairly high membership numbers, especially BSA.

Being president was a lot of work. Besides leading the meetings, I had to coordinate events, print flyers and post them, make phone calls, attend Ball State functions, and I even gave presentations to a couple of classes. I had help of course... from our secretary, treasurer, and vice president. The names of the active members were Tom, Beth, Scott, and Steve. The five of us were sometimes the only ones who showed up for meetings.

We worked very hard not only to set up events but to also reach out to American Indian students on campus and encourage them to get involved. We sent them notices of our meetings, and we advertised our major events to them. Still, no one came to our meetings.

We had Mary Brave Bird, author of Lakota Woman, come and speak (her book made me cry; her name on the book is actually Mary Crow Dog). We also had a clothes and food drive for the Lakota of Pine Ridge, South Dakota, who are among the poorest of people living on reservations. Our biggest event was a powwow, held in the spring. I was working two jobs and attending full time classes. When I look back, I don't know how I did it all.

When the end of the year rolled around, there was some discussion in the House of Multicultural Affairs about whether our group should call it quits for the following year or keep going. None of our members wanted the group to quit, except one as it turns out.

Just a few days before graduation, we had a guest speaker, and afterwards we gathered in the student center to take a vote on whether or not to keep going. This is where I'd like to start my "do over". There were many people there, including the HMA personnel, the founder of the Native American Student Association (which was originally called Students of Native American Cultures but we renamed it because too many people thought it was a group of people interested in the culture rather than actual American Indian students), and even our guest speaker hung around for the meeting.

A girl was there who had attended one or two of our meetings during the year. She was African American and claimed to have some Indian heritage. I never doubted people because you really can't tell by looking at someone. I cannot remember her name (I think I blocked it from memory). Before our vote there was some discussion. I had observed in the past that this girl had a particularly nasty temperament, and she demonstrated it here. She was really down on our group and the main thing I remember her saying was "Well, I just didn't see any Native American leadership in this group." To top it off, the vice-president of our group was sitting right next to her and said "I just didn't feel like my voice was heard." I could not believe he said that because I would always ask him... "Scott, what do you think?" and he would usually respond with "I don't care". He rarely spoke up, and I wanted to make sure he had the chance because he was one of the few "legitimate" students in the group (he is part of the Delaware Indians, and I still see him around once in awhile, though I have not talked to him. He even had a display in the Eiteljorg museum).

I was quite emotional that day for many reasons. I didn't want the group to quit, I didn't like being criticized when we had worked so hard, I was about to graduate and move to Indy with no job, and I was going through major relationship changes. So, I cried. In front of all those people I sat there and cried and didn't yell what I wanted to yell at those two. At the time, the American Indian heritage in my family was mostly based on speculation. In the meeting I muttered something about how I didn't really know if I was Indian or not. Oh, how I wish I could take that back! Now I know it's in my blood for sure (see previous post)!

I said "Let's just vote", and unfortunately the vote was to disband the group. I was not the only one who cried... Beth did too. All of the hard-working people in the group were upset. I hugged Steve, and some Indian woman whom I didn't know hugged me. She was very nice and said "I didn't know you weren't Indian.", and I said "That's just it... I don't know." That was comment number two I want to take back. I left the student center in tears and somewhat humiliated, and the whole event has bothered me since.

If I could go back, I would say to the girl "First of all, you only came to two meetings, so your opinion about this group's leadership is meaningless. Also, we tried to reach out to students through the year. They did not respond, but we tried. So I didn't grow up on a reservation, and my family may not practice any of the culture, but I have Cherokee ancestry. I was elected by the group, and I did my best. I didn't see YOU trying." And to Scott, I would say "I asked you if you had any input or opinion on things and most of the time you didn't. How can you say your voice was not heard? If you really wanted to say something, you should have spoken up."

I recently contacted the House of Multicultural Affairs out of curiosity, to see if they had reestablished a group. They have not done so yet, but the current organizer said they are looking into it.

Well, it was certainly a learning experience. I lost touch with all of the group members after that day. I wish I could talk to them again. It really sucked to end that way after working together all year.

Thankful It's Over

Thanksgiving was a lot of fun, but I'm glad the driving is over. We travelled over four hours... first to see my mom and step-dad and that side of the family and second to see my dad and step-mom and her three daughters (two of whom I had never met). We spent 3 hours in each location. Tomorrow I will cook turkey and all the trimmings for James's side of our family. It was great to see everyone... and Christmas is just around the corner, so we'll see most of them again soon!

Harry Potter!!

I took a half day off of work on Friday to go see Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire with my friends. It was awesome! They really condensed the book down, but they did a great job of it. It is a huge book and I wondered where they would cut corners. Goblet had everything you could want in a movie... drama, humor, action, and even romance. It is now my favorite HP movie so far, followed by Prisoner of Azkaban, Sorcerer's Stone, and Chamber of Secrets. Chamber is still excellent, but it's my least favorite. I am still trying to figure out why Harry heard the basilisk speaking Parseltongue from inside the water pipes all year, yet when he met him face to serpenty face, the basilisk didn't say a single thing.

I am playing the Goblet of Fire video game... can't get enough Harry Potter.

November Already?

Halloween came and went in a flash. Tess was the cutest witch! Now Thanksgiving is just around the corner, and it's going to be a busy one. It all starts on Wednesday, when I will be preparing dishes to take with me the following day. On Thanksgiving day we will travel down towards Bloomington to my mom's (a 1 hour, 20 minute drive), where we will eat Thanksgiving lunch (and a lot of dessert). At 3pm, we will depart mom's and head to Rushville (a 2 hour drive) to see my dad. His wife's three daughters will be there, and I have never met two of them. We will have Thanksgiving dinner there (and more dessert). Then we will head back home to Indianapolis (1 more hour in the car) that night. But it doesn't end there...

The next day, I will get up at 6am to dress yet another turkey and put it in the oven. James's parents, two siblings and their kids, and grandma are coming over for Thanksgiving at our house. Let's see, that's a total of 14 people. I will make potatoes and gravy, oyster dressing, cranberry sauce, rolls, pumpkin pie, and probably some deviled eggs. Good thing I like to cook.

Ah, the holidays... so relaxing...

Baby Talk

Tess is 9 months old today. She's been out of the womb for as long as she was in. She's getting such a personality now... perhaps a bit of an attitude. She's adding more sounds to her vocabulary. She's crawling and pulling herself up. It's amazing how fast babies develop. I never knew that babies laughed so much. Tess laughs hysterically at the puppets in her Baby Einstein videos and at her daddy's antics. When she's happy, she says "da da da", but when she's mad, she says "ma ma ma". What a daddy's girl.