My ex-wife is white and the first time I brought her to the rez is pretty crazy.
We had to get our newborn son Teeias registered at membership. On my rez both parents need to come in and sign a couple forms and pay five bucks, simple right?
We drive down in the old hotrod, my ‘72 Chevy Nova (which I bought instead of a family mini van, but that’s another story, lol).
The ex-wife is all “oooo” and “ahhh” as we cruise the rez.
“You mean, anyone can just come here? I thought there’d be reservation border guards or something”, she queries.
Me: *rolls eyes, Indigenously
Blackfoots ain’t used to a hotrod in their midst, so our arrival is anything but incognito. I hurry my white wife past the throngs of curious red skins, and beeline straight for the band office. Baby Teeias is hungry, so he is fussy, we rush through the paperwork.
“Huh-iya”, I exclaim in Blackfoot, “I forgot the five bucks!”
Half breed baby Teeias is just starting to cry as I leave my fully white wife alone with a bunch of stoic Blackfoots and rush out the door in search of five bucks.
I push thru the dense crowd surrounding my stupid hotrod, go to put in the key to open the door, look inside - Raynard Brave Rock is sitting in the drivers seat, pretending to drive, complete with pretend driving sounds. I sit in the passengers seat, and search frantically for five bucks.
Brave Rock is a bit high so he is kicking back being cool, he says “Why you trippin’, bro? Live and love, man, live and love!”
I explain my dilemma.
Brave Rock suddenly swings open the door, leaps from the seat, stands on the roof of my war pony, and yells in broken Blackfoot “Niskunis, kistoo O’mahk’siik’iimi noi sabooksis” (Friends, our brother needs five bucks!)
It’s the rez, so money is tight, but one by one, cuzzin after cuzzin came forward with the money that jingles. Some cuzzins only had a couple “brown brothers” (pennies) to offer, but offer they did.
Anyways, us Blackfoots gather just enough change to get my son registered as a legal Blackfoot. We’re all cheering and war crying and high fiving each other …
until
… I’ve always heard about conniptions, but I’d never actually seen one … just beyond the crowd of smiling red skins I see my white wife, crying hysterically. Her pearl white skin is now bright red (that happens to white people when they get worked up, it’s science. Go on Youtube and Google it, lol).
I yell for her, the red skin crowd parts like the Red Sea. I run towards my crying white wife, and my half breed baby in his cradle board on her back, scream crying. With the whole rez watching, she breaks down, bawling.
I finally get her into the car and she says, all in one breath, “Teeias wouldn’t stop crying, so the Blackfoot ladies started telling me to feed him, but I’m breastfeeding. They said ‘so what, we’re all women here’, but I’ve never felt so surrounded in all my life, so I ran out of the office crying, all the Indians looking at me, I was so scared, then I come outside and there’s even more Indians surrounding your stupid hotrod and you. I’ve never felt so surrounded in all my life, how about you???”
Me: “This is how Indians feel every day. Surrounded. Every. Single. Day. We’re just used to it.”
Here’s the funny part: towards the end of our marriage, she was going to the rez all by herself and learned Blackfoot from my grandma.