Stanford got out of the hospital two days ago, a little less than six
weeks after he went in. Hooray!

His sister Arilda drove down to Cheyenne to pick him up in her
Suburban (with a mattress laid down so he doesn’t have to sit up),
while his son Daniel ferried Stanford’s wheelchair home in the pickup.
When I spoke to him today, Stan was extremely excited to get out of
the hospital, and even more excited to have his first
cigarette.

He’ll be in bed for a week at least to heal from his bedsore surgery.

heading into the sweat lodge at Stanford's late August

In other news, I’m sure you’ve read the sad news about the sweat lodge
in Sedona, Arizona, in which two people died a week ago. I’ve been
thinking about it a lot. It brings up a question about the place of
nonnative people in Native spiritual practice. It seems like anyone
of any ethnicity who charges dozens of people $10,000 apiece to do a
five day “Spiritual Warriors” retreat before putting them in a plastic-
lined sweat lodge is going to evoke the wrath of a spirit or two.

For Stanford’s part, he believes that white people (not to mention black and yellow people) came to America in order to learn about the Creator. Spiritual
renaissance, he says, is the main reason we’re all here
together. We live, he says, in the spirit land. His grandpa, a
medicine man, told him so. And when he got his own powers,  his
spirits told him the same thing.

So, how should white folks handle themselves in Native American spiritual ceremonies?

Here are some opinions.

“Indian Spirituality is for Indians only. We had these beliefs and
ceremonies long before the white settlers brought their Bible across
the ocean and they withstood all the assaults by the Church to destroy
them. It is high time the Indian people took them back and closed
their ceremonies to outsiders.”
– unsigned editorial, Native Sun News, Aug.
19-25, 2009

“The absence of water during the heat is really disturbing and
potentially dangerous for a northerner with genes intended for fat and
cold and lots of water. Indians with their dark skin can do things
that we fair skinned people simply are not intended to expose
ourselves to. Witness Sven Hedin’s adventures when more or less all of
the expedition died somewhere in Asia after having resorted to
drinking urine.
Love,
Ma
P.S.
My mother knew Sven, who was a famous explorer.
Pay attention to your genetic make up and respect it. You are not an
Indian. Maybe you need to be respectful of that.”

– my Swedish mother, in a letter to me in
2005, in response to me wanting to intensify my involvement in
Northern Arapaho spiritual ceremonies.

“Wannabe!” snapped a young Lakota after ending a conversation with an
eager white man en route to a powwow.
“Wannabe?” replied his grandfather. “You mean, ‘wants to be
connected.’”
– from Dreamkeeper, a 2003 feature film about the Lakota,
past and present
(the quote may not be totally accurate, but it’s close. And
DREAMKEEPER is a
wonderful, lovely, deep, funny movie. Really worth seeing.)

Ciao for now,

Lisa

I visited Stanford in the Cheyenne hospital last night and I’m here to
tell you that he may be home within a week! This would make his entire
stay slightly longer than a month — which is a whole lot better than
the four months that was being bandied about at first. His surgeon was
Dr. William Wyatt (one of count ‘em THREE reconstructive and plastic
surgeons in the state of Wyoming, Dr. Wyatt is my hero as he works all
week on low income patients, confines his tummy tuck and face lift
practice to Saturdays, and spends his vacations in Honduras fixing
childrens’ cleft palates.)

Dr. Wyatt cut into Stan’s ischial bone (the one you sit on) and
removed the dead and infected part of it (a process called “debriding”
the bone), stitched him up, and decided Stan’s home health nurse up on
the reservation can take out the stiches (which I believe are more
like metal staples — they were last time) when he’s healed. Stan is
currently trying to wean himself off heavy-duty pain medication to
expedite the going home process. It isn’t easy, but it’s better than
four months away from home. Last night was fun — my visit coincided
with a visit from Stan’s sister Arilda and her son Sass, and Stan’s
son Daniel (who had been with sleeping on the couch in the hospital
room and generally attending to his dad for 10 days) was being
replaced by Shiloh, a young nephew. It was great to see everyone. Stan
chatted and watched Iron Chef on TV.

Thanks to everyone who contributed to his piggy bank in the last few
weeks — the $1,350 you gave went towards shuttling relatives back and
forth, paying a debt, and paying bills. As Daniel left, Stanford said, “remember to buy hay.”

Oh! In BOOK news, Scribner is happy we’ve done well in the first few months and are already sending me design
ideas for the paperback. I think that may be hitting the stands sooner
than expected. Yay! Meanwhile, I’m turning my attention to getting
some paying work on non-Stan topics from the world of journalism. But
journalism seems to have sort of turned into a pet turtle (is it dead?
why isn’t it moving?) while I was writing this book. Maybe I’ll have
to just write another book. Since they’re so easy to write. I’m
kidding. Okay, I’m signing off;
I’ll write again when there’s more news in the Stan and paperback
worlds.

Toodles!

840 miles, two radio interviews, three readings (four if you count the fact we read twice in Santa Fe), 23,685 french fries, one narrowly missed goat (which ran out on the road near Farmington, N.M. in front of Stanford’s truck in the photo to the right) one hawk that dove in front of my car outside of Del Norte, Colorado, (also narrowly missed), one coyote eating something on the side of I-25 near Pueblo, another trotting off into the sage near Santa Fe, a sweat lodge, three households thrown open to the needs of nine travelers….. after all that, we’re all basically collapsed at my house. Today, we recuperate; tomorrow, we part.

The readings — in Santa Fe, N.M., and in Colorado in Durango and Salida — were great. People really liked the stories and pretty much melted around Stanford. A cowboy who runs a therapeutic horsemanship program for veterans came; so did two old pals of mine from Manual High School in Denver…There was a lot of chile (thanks Erich!), a great sweat lodge at Angelique and David Midthunder’s house, late night music, a couple of too-early mornings, coffee, coffee, coffee. Oh, and the radio interviews (the afterglow of our first one can be seen below), and a third one done over the phone with me days before we arrived can be listened to here: http://www.santaferadiocafe.org/podcasts/?p=678.

Driving the last leg through South Park, Colorado yesterday afternoon was absolutely magical. Fall in the light and the air, and the feeling of being done done done done. Yum.

at Teresa Neptune's gallery in Santa Fe last Saturday

Three-woman show: Photographer Teresa Neptune, documentary filmmaker Angelique Midthunder, Stanford, and me, all in Santa Fe on Saturday

Marshall is tired

Dear friends,

My living room is full of sleeping Arapahos — Stanford on the nice
foamy pad, and Daniel, Shiloh, Marshall and JR variously on couches or
on the floor on camping pads. They arrived last night, for a
restorative dinner of bratwurst and root beer floats. Soon I will shoe
horn then out of bed and we will pack up and start our Southwestern
tour. Like a rock band. But instead of a big black bus we’ll convoy in
a large Dodge pickup with new hubs and Wyoming plates, a Honda Insight
the color of a margarita, (my husband’s pride and joy — he’s coming!
yay!), and an Audi containing our pals Peter Heller and Kim Yan. It’s
gonna be a party.

Here’s our schedule. Come on down if you’re in the area, or please let
any friends who live nearby know about these readings. Thanks!

August 22, 4-7 p.m.
Teresa Neptune Studio/Gallery
616 1/2 A Canyon Road
Santa Fe, New Mexico 87501

This is a collaborative event with photographer Teresa Neptune and
documentary film director Angelique Midthunder
The event will be held during Indian Market.

For full details, go here: http://www.teresaneptune.com/CurrentExhibit2.html

THEN,

Monday, August 24, 6:30 p.m.
Maria’s Bookshop
960 Main Avenue
Durango, Colorado
www.mariasbookshop.com
970.247.1438

Tuesday, August 25, 2-4 p.m.
Salida Regional Library
405 E. St.
Salida, Colorado 81201
(719) 539-4826

Now I make a very large pot of coffee. Bye for now,

Hey y’all, an excerpt of BROKEN has been posted in Killing the Buddha, a great blog I just heard about this summer. You can find it here.

I’ve lifted this explanation of the blog from its own manifesto: Killing the Buddha is a religion magazine for people made anxious by churches, people embarrassed to be caught in the “spirituality” section of a bookstore, people both hostile and drawn to talk of God. It is for people who somehow want to be religious, who want to know what it means to know the divine, but for good reasons are not and do not. If the religious have come to own religious discourse it is because they alone have had places where religious language could be spoken and understood. Now there is a forum for the supposedly non-religious to think and talk about what religion is, is not and might be. Killing the Buddha is it.

The idea of “killing the Buddha” comes from a famous Zen line, the context of which is easy to imagine: After years on his cushion, a monk has what he believes is a breakthrough: a glimpse of nirvana, the Buddhamind, the big pay-off. Reporting the experience to his master, however, he is informed that what has happened is par for the course, nothing special, maybe even damaging to his pursuit. And then the master gives the student dismaying advice: If you meet the Buddha, he says, kill him.

Why kill the Buddha? Because the Buddha you meet is not the true Buddha, but an expression of your longing. If this Buddha is not killed he will only stand in your way.

Here’s a picture of Stanford’s son Daniel and me at a reading last week at the Lander (Wyoming) Public Library. Daniel is inspecting the April 27 issue of High Country News with a cover of him dressed in traditional Native dress at a pow wow.

It was great to to read from BROKEN in Stanford’s backyard (he lives about 20 miles from Lander.) The library was packed with, as a local pal of mine put it, “cowboys and Indians and Democrats,” plus a big-hearted sheriff’s deputy who has escorted some of the younger Addisons into and out of jail (and is an awesome cowboy poet.) I read Stanford’s life story and the beginnings of his spiritual life, in a effort to introduce the larger community to this amazing man. I often choke up after reading about the car crash that paralyzed him, and I did this time too, but due to poor acoustics I had to pretty much yell for the entire reading, and it felt really good to have to keep yelling the ups and downs of this remarkable tale to this very receptive audience.

When I was done and Stanford and co. joined me up front to answer questions, an older lady raised her hand and said, STAN, CAN YOU GET MY HORSE TO STOP WALKING INTO CATTLE GUARDS? Which gave me the giggles. Wyoming. The library reading was the second of the evening; we started with a smaller, more intimate reading a few blocks away at the Noble Hotel — headquarters of the National Outdoor Leadership School.

Then I spent a day at Stanford’s, ending with a sweat lodge so intense that I was sick for about 18 hours. But I started recovering during the drive home with my nice new friend Ciska and her three-year-old daughter Isela (who was like a cartoon princess, all braids and bouncing up to the horses at Stanford’s and shouting up at their noses ARE YOU HUNGRY???) which was lovely. We went from milkshake to milkshake all the way home as those were pretty much the only things I could swallow.

Stanford looked a little under the weather when we arrived, but after two readings, one sweat lodge, some protein and some vitamin powder my mom sent up with me with a stern and maternal note, he looked much better by the time we left. He’s going to be bedridden until his next doctor’s appointment in mid-August, and we’re all hoping he can come to the reading in Santa Fe, NM on Aug. 22 (plus Durango and Salida, CO on the days after. See the TOUR page of this blog for details.)

review by Susan Salter Reynolds

“Not only horses get broken around here,” writes Lisa Jones, a journalist who was almost devoured by a remarkable assignment on the West. In particular, she is writing of the Wind River Range in Wyoming where her subject, Stanford Addison, lives.

“Everything does, starting with the ground itself. Millions of years ago, a new mountain range broke through the Ancestral Rocky Mountains, leaving the original range’s broken remains leaning against the flanks of the Wind River Range.”

Jones, 42, was sent by Smithsonian magazine to profile Addison, “a quadriplegic Northern Arapaho reputed to be able to talk rank beginners through the process of breaking horses.” Addison, a “bad boy outlaw” into drugs and women and cars and horses, survived a violent accident when he was 20. The broken-down “res ride” he was in collided with horses on the road one night. His spinal cord was cut at neck level. Addison came to in a hospital surrounded by white people and a multitude of visions. His reputation as a spiritual healer grew. After finishing the article, Jones went back to spend five years researching this book. In Addison’s presence, she was broken, found some happiness, was often afraid and more often confused. Regardless of what you choose to believe about her story, doors were opened. Addison and his world, she writes, “were jewels, but dark ones, rich with the blood of people and horses and dogs that died for nothing, for carelessness or a flash of anger or too much drink or no reason at all.” Jones, the self-deprecating journalist (“Why couldn’t I shut up? Why did I get so nervous and yappy?”), locates herself beautifully in a story that is hers and not hers. This is her first book. We look forward to the next.

See LA Times

The Woman’s Day Reading List

“This memoir, by a journalist who went to Wyoming’s Wind River Indian Reservation on assignment and stayed off/on for four years, revolves around Stanford Addison, a wheelchair-bound Native American spiritual healer and horse breaker. Mixed in with his tale are a brief history of the Northern Araphos tribe, the heartbreaking reality of modern reservation life and Lisa Jones’ own journey of personal and spiritual growth. But, more revealing than the author’s insights gained from sweat lodges and the nuggets of wisdom that Addison provides, is the honest range of emotions she is unafraid to acknowledge. From the guilt she feels as a white woman on a reservation to the lust she has for a man that is not her boyfriend, these sentiments she shares show the reader that we are all nothing but our feelings if we cannot understand, and eventually, control them.”– Meghan Ahearn

For their full list of recommended reads, click here.

I’m in the beautiful, misty, cool, confiding mountains of western North Carolina. Taking lots of walks, eating lots of pork, spending time with my lovely in-laws and my husband, the golf-crazed Buddhist. And here’s a terrific blog link by Molly Brown, which offers a nifty free drawing for my book.

Molly Brown blog