James Giago Davies: We need to come together as a sovereign tribal nation

Friday, September 29, 2017

There is no longer a need to keep score

We just need to stand unified as a sovereign nation
By James Giago Davies
Native Sun News Today Columnist
nativesunnews.today

Every year professional baseball teams play a 162 game season. Many teams reach the point where one more loss consigns them to a losing season. Winning every single game until the end of the season will not change that.

Recently, I took a friend on a tour of the Pine Ridge Reservation. I imagined before we started, before we turned south off the interstate at Kadoka, that the record was 0-0. By the time we reached Pine Ridge village, I realized we had reached the one-more-loss point of no return.

What would I see that would become the loss that doomed the Oglala to a losing season? Plenty of eyesore on either side of the road as you head west on Highway 18. But I refused to let that reality force that critical loss. Couldn’t I just steel myself into a cocoon of optimism that would look past all of the blight and degradation and see the eternal spirit and strength of the Tribe?

Everyday, Lakota do just that. They get up, and get on with life, struggle against poverty, and meth addiction, and alcoholism, and violence, and many are able to look past the overarching reality that they are the worst thing that ever happened to the people they love. These Lakota are not trying to be ikce wicasa, they just want to stop being sica wicasa.

Since I see much of myself in these flawed Lakota, and cannot escape that I am a product of this world, I want to complete this journey never allowing that critical loss to be tallied. And when the vehicle reaches Big Bat’s junction, and I can turn left to White Clay, or right to Oglala, I make the mistake of looking left and I see Billy Mills Hall.