Thank you for this. Your writing about bufffalo really moved me. I've been thinking about buffalo for decades now, right after I read The Things They Carried. I had to teach the short stories to 12th graders, and watched my soul die and float away each time I had to read about the way the soldiers shot water buffalo, the buffalo that were supposed to symbolize my Vietnamese people who are otherwise just a body count in the book. The hope I recuperated from these traumatic moments was from the shared outrage my students had, confronted with their emotional Vietnamese 12th grade English teacher. Thanks for providing some beautiful thoughts about buffalo today.
It is my official position that fourth graders calling you Emotional Yeti automatically qualifies you as a legend. But then, you've been a legend in my book for years. Thanks for sharing this one, Chris. 🙏
Thanks for this, Chris. Beautifully written, and very moving, again. I was in Great Falls this week to visit family and I spent some time at the Charlie Russell Museum. Of course, I enjoy Russell's depictions of the plains, its wildlife, and people before colonization. And the cowboy stuff, too, but that always feels more problematic. But I saw this untitled etching in Charlie Russell's workshop and it stopped me in my tracks. I was struck with sadness - maybe grief? It was of an elderly Indian man seated, maybe on a mat, in the foreground and staring at a bison skull on the ground before him. He is beside a road and a well-dressed white woman is riding by on a bicycle looking back at him. There is a fencerow behind him, and telegraph poles with wires. A tall smokestack is belching black smoke in the distance. And in the sky the clouds are wispy images of horseback Indians hunting in a herd of bison. It was untitled, and there wasn't a copy available in the gift shop. When I saw it I thought of some of your recent writings. And I was reminded of my own difficult feelings when I drive out on 200 to visit friends at the very eastern edge of the state. I mean, I'm not an Indian, but I can still sense in some small way, the tremendous and overwhelming loss and emptiness.
Thanks again for putting your thoughts into words every week.
Thank you, Marirose, I know that image. It's powerful. Russell was pretty instrumental in getting the Rocky Boy Reservation established. His cowboy days were in the heart of Métis country.
There's this narrative arc we go through, so many of us, that boils down to "The pain and destruction of this world is too much to bear but the beauty of this [bird/flower/baby's laughter/sunrise over the Missions] is what we have to focus on to remember what's important and make it all bearable." But the thing is, while that is true, it's not enough, is it? It never was. I want the human-inflicted pain and suffering to be so rare as to be truly shocking, and the beauty and love to be what saturates all at every moment.
I'm not sure there's anything in the world like the sight of those mountains coming over the hill from Missoula. It always makes me long to see that entire valley fence-free and full of buffalo, as it once was.
O emotional yeti is possibly the best, most loving nickname ever--those lucky kids you teach. This made me cry in the best way--I've been feeling this too with what is happening--the historical hauntings of it all being stirred to life and yet we ignore that they've been the white hot coals that have never been extinguished. I have to believe that the love for the world is also the anger--it fuels it but overtakes me at times, personally. It's so hard and so raw to see it all. To absorb the trauma of herds that are fenced in. I fucking hate that sign with the fucking 'founders.' I hate seeing the name of Captain Cook all over this damned city of Anchorage. I too want to pay attention to the dreams of a different life of care. But as always, I read your work and feel alive and less alone in it all. The poem is so beautiful--I've begun to believe that animals are the real gods, and I will be thinking long about the fact that the word for buffalo means Respect, that their life given is one of care for others. Thank you friend, so needed to read this today.
Thanks! This is a powerful message of energy ... the poem at the end of the article, did you write? It pierces armor. But tell me, won't it always be like this?: big and strong nations absorb smaller ones, the strong want to destroy the weak, the rich want to become even richer and there is no end to this evil.
That is my poem at the end, thank you. As for whether it will always be like this ... perhaps in our lifetime, yes. But maybe the work we do helps the future not have to be this way.
Thanks! You're right! I really want to learn more about the culture of the Indians, about beliefs, about how they live now. I do not know why. Maybe my interest was awakened by reading the books of Carlos Castaneda, maybe it was the call of the blood. When I look at photographs of my ancestors, I see a certain similarity in facial features and skin tone. Even my father looks like an Indian. Maybe you will agree to become a guide to this world?
It's a little complicated. But traditionally, it is more a collection of spirits akin to how the Catholic saints have relationship to various parts of life. Now, most of us are Christian.
I've reread your essay multiple times. So many layers... Today, I happened upon Nick Cave's response to the question, "Aren't you just so fucking angry?" from The Red Hand Files archives. It made me think of you :-)
He wrote: "...the anger at the indifference and casual cruelty of this world can still burn bright, but it does not define us, for the oxygen that fuels that anger is love – love for the world and love for the people in it. Love becomes anger’s great animator, as it should, as it must. Love, Nick"
I believe love fuels your anger, too, Chris. You are not alone in this.
Thank you for sharing Yevgenia's War Diary. I spent hours binge reading her entries from day one, imagining daily life in Kiev over the past three weeks. I appreciate her courage and fortitude in sharing her thoughts and photos in such distressing conditions.
You truly are fortunate to be able to see buffalo so often. Years ago, I was lucky to gaze on the ones in the Lamar Valley. I'm trying to imagine vast herds stretching across the landscape now.
I wonder if the beaver are sacred to some indigenous people. When reading Eager, by Ben Goldfarb, I was struck by how beavers so perfectly fit into ecosystems before fences and farming and drainage. As a child growing up in a suburb, I thought of beavers as sentient beings, probably because of some child's book I read, fed by images of beavers thacking their tails to warn their community, of adults diving to enter a lodge with the kits clinging to them. They cared for each other. I know that the modern worldview has a different definition of sentient, most unwilling to admit even dolphins or whales or elephants or the great apes or chimpanzees to this highest of all groups, mankind, thought to be ordained by God to be superior. But there is some deep non-cognitive recognition in me, despite my upbringing, that insists that we are not to be in dominion over the earth. It is the part of me that is howling even at the thought of blowing up buildings and bodies, much less nuclear war. Like you, I cannot bear too much witness to this insanity, lest the howling take me down.
Beaver is sacred. He represents Wisdom in the Anishinaabe 7 Grandfather Teachings.
I think more and more the sentience of the non-human world is being recognized. If you haven't read it yet, I highly recommend Carl Safina's "Beyond Words."
Thank you for taking me back to a moment I cherish. Every time I drove Route 93 up out of Ravalli, I pretended that I had a friend in the passenger's seat who had never before beheld the mountains over St. Ignatius. It always felt like the first time for me, too.
“I dream those villains into blooming flowers on trees spreading across a healing land”. How very powerful!!! Thank you for this image.
There is so much that is heartbreaking. So many people across the world and time have been so severely damaged and disregarded. It is sickening. I pray so very hard that all of this will change.
Thank you for this. Your writing about bufffalo really moved me. I've been thinking about buffalo for decades now, right after I read The Things They Carried. I had to teach the short stories to 12th graders, and watched my soul die and float away each time I had to read about the way the soldiers shot water buffalo, the buffalo that were supposed to symbolize my Vietnamese people who are otherwise just a body count in the book. The hope I recuperated from these traumatic moments was from the shared outrage my students had, confronted with their emotional Vietnamese 12th grade English teacher. Thanks for providing some beautiful thoughts about buffalo today.
Thank you for this perspective, Thu. I can so relate to what you are saying.
Me too. Me too.
And me. I'll be thinking on it for a long time. That's it, and it's so beautiful.
It is my official position that fourth graders calling you Emotional Yeti automatically qualifies you as a legend. But then, you've been a legend in my book for years. Thanks for sharing this one, Chris. 🙏
Thank you, Jackie. 🙏🏽
This was just a wonderful nuanced read. "The degree to which I yet love the world is unmeasurable." ♥️
Thank you, Lyz. ❤️
Thanks for this, Chris. Beautifully written, and very moving, again. I was in Great Falls this week to visit family and I spent some time at the Charlie Russell Museum. Of course, I enjoy Russell's depictions of the plains, its wildlife, and people before colonization. And the cowboy stuff, too, but that always feels more problematic. But I saw this untitled etching in Charlie Russell's workshop and it stopped me in my tracks. I was struck with sadness - maybe grief? It was of an elderly Indian man seated, maybe on a mat, in the foreground and staring at a bison skull on the ground before him. He is beside a road and a well-dressed white woman is riding by on a bicycle looking back at him. There is a fencerow behind him, and telegraph poles with wires. A tall smokestack is belching black smoke in the distance. And in the sky the clouds are wispy images of horseback Indians hunting in a herd of bison. It was untitled, and there wasn't a copy available in the gift shop. When I saw it I thought of some of your recent writings. And I was reminded of my own difficult feelings when I drive out on 200 to visit friends at the very eastern edge of the state. I mean, I'm not an Indian, but I can still sense in some small way, the tremendous and overwhelming loss and emptiness.
Thanks again for putting your thoughts into words every week.
Thank you, Marirose, I know that image. It's powerful. Russell was pretty instrumental in getting the Rocky Boy Reservation established. His cowboy days were in the heart of Métis country.
I'm left speechless. This was -- is -- an uncommon gift, Chris. Thank you.
Thank you, Sarah. I appreciate it.
There's this narrative arc we go through, so many of us, that boils down to "The pain and destruction of this world is too much to bear but the beauty of this [bird/flower/baby's laughter/sunrise over the Missions] is what we have to focus on to remember what's important and make it all bearable." But the thing is, while that is true, it's not enough, is it? It never was. I want the human-inflicted pain and suffering to be so rare as to be truly shocking, and the beauty and love to be what saturates all at every moment.
I'm not sure there's anything in the world like the sight of those mountains coming over the hill from Missoula. It always makes me long to see that entire valley fence-free and full of buffalo, as it once was.
No, it's not enough ... but sometimes it is.
O emotional yeti is possibly the best, most loving nickname ever--those lucky kids you teach. This made me cry in the best way--I've been feeling this too with what is happening--the historical hauntings of it all being stirred to life and yet we ignore that they've been the white hot coals that have never been extinguished. I have to believe that the love for the world is also the anger--it fuels it but overtakes me at times, personally. It's so hard and so raw to see it all. To absorb the trauma of herds that are fenced in. I fucking hate that sign with the fucking 'founders.' I hate seeing the name of Captain Cook all over this damned city of Anchorage. I too want to pay attention to the dreams of a different life of care. But as always, I read your work and feel alive and less alone in it all. The poem is so beautiful--I've begun to believe that animals are the real gods, and I will be thinking long about the fact that the word for buffalo means Respect, that their life given is one of care for others. Thank you friend, so needed to read this today.
"I have to believe that the love for the world is also the anger" is what keeps me going too. Thank you, as always....
That’s a beautiful dream, and I hope we can make it true. Emotional Yeti made me smile, my friend calls me a “temperate yeti.”
Brothers from different mothers! 😂
Verklempt, indeed. Thank you for your words and heart
💚
Thanks! This is a powerful message of energy ... the poem at the end of the article, did you write? It pierces armor. But tell me, won't it always be like this?: big and strong nations absorb smaller ones, the strong want to destroy the weak, the rich want to become even richer and there is no end to this evil.
That is my poem at the end, thank you. As for whether it will always be like this ... perhaps in our lifetime, yes. But maybe the work we do helps the future not have to be this way.
Thanks! You're right! I really want to learn more about the culture of the Indians, about beliefs, about how they live now. I do not know why. Maybe my interest was awakened by reading the books of Carlos Castaneda, maybe it was the call of the blood. When I look at photographs of my ancestors, I see a certain similarity in facial features and skin tone. Even my father looks like an Indian. Maybe you will agree to become a guide to this world?
There are many different cultures among American Indians, of course, and I am but one person. But I do my best, thank you. 🙏🏽
I would be interested to know who worships the people to which you belong? Is there a God?
It's a little complicated. But traditionally, it is more a collection of spirits akin to how the Catholic saints have relationship to various parts of life. Now, most of us are Christian.
it is surprising! That is, you are Christians, you live in a country of Catholics? Who was your grandmother? Can I see a photo of your ancestors?
I've reread your essay multiple times. So many layers... Today, I happened upon Nick Cave's response to the question, "Aren't you just so fucking angry?" from The Red Hand Files archives. It made me think of you :-)
He wrote: "...the anger at the indifference and casual cruelty of this world can still burn bright, but it does not define us, for the oxygen that fuels that anger is love – love for the world and love for the people in it. Love becomes anger’s great animator, as it should, as it must. Love, Nick"
I believe love fuels your anger, too, Chris. You are not alone in this.
Thank you so much for this, Joni. I love Cave's insights. It means a lot to be associated with them.
Thank you for sharing Yevgenia's War Diary. I spent hours binge reading her entries from day one, imagining daily life in Kiev over the past three weeks. I appreciate her courage and fortitude in sharing her thoughts and photos in such distressing conditions.
You truly are fortunate to be able to see buffalo so often. Years ago, I was lucky to gaze on the ones in the Lamar Valley. I'm trying to imagine vast herds stretching across the landscape now.
I wonder if the beaver are sacred to some indigenous people. When reading Eager, by Ben Goldfarb, I was struck by how beavers so perfectly fit into ecosystems before fences and farming and drainage. As a child growing up in a suburb, I thought of beavers as sentient beings, probably because of some child's book I read, fed by images of beavers thacking their tails to warn their community, of adults diving to enter a lodge with the kits clinging to them. They cared for each other. I know that the modern worldview has a different definition of sentient, most unwilling to admit even dolphins or whales or elephants or the great apes or chimpanzees to this highest of all groups, mankind, thought to be ordained by God to be superior. But there is some deep non-cognitive recognition in me, despite my upbringing, that insists that we are not to be in dominion over the earth. It is the part of me that is howling even at the thought of blowing up buildings and bodies, much less nuclear war. Like you, I cannot bear too much witness to this insanity, lest the howling take me down.
Beaver is sacred. He represents Wisdom in the Anishinaabe 7 Grandfather Teachings.
I think more and more the sentience of the non-human world is being recognized. If you haven't read it yet, I highly recommend Carl Safina's "Beyond Words."
https://bookshop.org/books/beyond-words-what-animals-think-and-feel/9781250094599
Thank you for taking me back to a moment I cherish. Every time I drove Route 93 up out of Ravalli, I pretended that I had a friend in the passenger's seat who had never before beheld the mountains over St. Ignatius. It always felt like the first time for me, too.
It always DOES feel like the first time.
Beautiful, as usual, Chris. I'll be sitting with this for awhile:
Who else then to resume the ritual
than me, than us?
I appreciate that, Sara.
Hi Chris,
“I dream those villains into blooming flowers on trees spreading across a healing land”. How very powerful!!! Thank you for this image.
There is so much that is heartbreaking. So many people across the world and time have been so severely damaged and disregarded. It is sickening. I pray so very hard that all of this will change.
Sincerely,
Melissa
🌻
🌺🌳🌺