Akayo'kaki A'pawaawahkaa: Mi'kotso'tokaaniksi Aiksikkiaakiyaa

20 December 2008

Mi'kotso'tokaaniksi Aiksikkiaakiyaa

llll ) llllllllllllllllllll Mi’kotso’tokaaniksi Aiksikkiaakiyaa

First day of clear blue skies for some sleeps now, and I had to get outside despite the severe cold. Bundled to the hilt, and yet still not quite enough, I took a walk along Naapisisahtaa, where it becomes confluent with Isski’taiitahtaa. I walked on the river itself, noting that the coyotes – like myself – follow a route along the ice close to the bank. I wonder if the sound of the water beneath keeps them away from the middle.

I took my time walking up to a still-open section of water, where there were significant aapsspiniiksi gathered. I moved only three or four paces at a time, pausing longer between. As I grew near, all the aapsspiniiksi stood up at once and quickly took to the air. At first, I was sure that I had finally scared them. But as they lifted, I saw the real culprit running along the ice on the other side, a single coyote who proceeded to follow them in their flight upriver. In their immediate absence, I found a good blind beside a boulder, where I could overlook the exposed water in case they returned. But after all grew quiet, and some further minutes passed, I decided to move on.

Entering the brush behind an older ksisskstakioyis, I began noticing curiously pattered carvings in bands around some of the willow stems. They were a kind of checker pattern or removed bark that reminded me immediately of the cut-out designs of old war shirts. I photographed several of the marked trees, thinking that they must have been made by something like a woodpecker… which was very interesting to me, because woodpeckers, flickers, and the like are very important allies to warriors, for their ability to quickly dodge or hop to the other side of a tree trunk. For many years, I’d thought the holes in the “bullet-proof” war shirts were merely that, representations of bullet or arrow holes, while the one wearing it goes undamaged. To realize that there may be a connection between these designs and certain birds multiplies the symbol’s significance. (After returning home this evening, I did a bit of research and question-asking online and found that the artist is almost definitely a sapsucker species, although which might prefer willow I don’t know)

Eventually, the aapsspiniiksi began slowly returning to the open water source, and by that time I was very cold and happy to start heading back in that direction. I followed an old ksisskstaki canal (now dry) out, along the way coming across a porcupine feeding near its den. This one had taken over one of the old ksisskstaki lodges along the side of the canal, perhaps moved from last-year’s porcupine location in a burrow under a nearby cottonwood. As I would soon learn, the latter den is now apparently occupied by coyotes.

I sight of the river just as a great wave of aapsspiniiksi passed overhead, coming from upriver. About a dozen of these decided to land in the open water where I was positioned. And no sooner had they sat down on the ice than I saw them jump to their feet again, and then watched as two coyotes came out onto the shore. They started trotting toward me, and came within about ten meters before they realized that I was sitting there. The two quickly turned and fled upriver, and the aapsspiniiksi calmed back down and sat again on the ice. When the coyotes climbed the bank some distance away, they began immediately to howl, and I watched as one of them threw clouds of snow in the air. I don’t know if they found something in that bank and were digging it out, announcing it, or what was going on. But soon they trotted off again, into the woods, where they continued to howl for the next ten minutes or so. By that time, the sun had gone a ways beyond the horizon, it was getting dark, and I made my way back to the truck, frozen toes and all.

Obsessing On Purpose

Like most living beings - human or otherwise - I have cultivated a number of behavioural routines and aesthetic predilections that bring structure, or perhaps a sense of security, to my everyday life. In some instances, these quirks and habits border on the embarrassingly obsessive-compulsive. For instance, at nookoowa, I routinely make sure that anything situated on tables or counters be set in an alignment parallel to the edges. Sometimes, nipiitaam or nitana will offset things purposely, just to watch me run around straightening them. On the other hand though, I prefer our tables and countertops to be absolutely empty except when in use, and all items that might otherwise be placed upon them to be neatly stowed away in closets, trunks, and cupboards. I also try to make sure that any like-type objects that happen to be stored on a shelf - such as books, video games, compact discs, statuettes, picture frames, what have you - are neatly aligned and arranged in some pleasing order. My bed must always be made, unless someone’s in it, and nothing beyond sheets, blankets, or pillows belongs on it. It bothers me when clothing is tossed on the floor, or draped anywhere other than on hangers in our closets. Furniture, in the form of couches, cushioned chairs, dining sets, etc. strike me as clutter, limiting the spaces that one would otherwise have available to conduct creative activities. I prefer to sit on the floor, with just a pillow or folded blanket for support. I don’t like any lighting except that which comes from naato’si, nor prolonged periods of electronic noise. The different foods on my plate cannot touch, unless we’re eating Mexican, in which case it must all be mixed together into a bean, cheese, and rice paste. And I don’t think sinks are places to keep dirty dishes, or sponges, or globs of fallen toothpaste… although they are for cleaning such things immediately. The list could go on, all these partialities that are so rarely realized to my satisfaction. The truth of the matter is, in the long run, most of my aesthetic habits bring me more irritation than comfort. Yet I continue to uphold them all the same.

One of my greatest obsessive-compulsive behaviours, a massive sink-hole of energy, and that which applies more than any other to the present project, is an overwhelming desire to document periods of transition in my life. I’ve been journaling since I was about twelve years old, using this practice as a surrogate companion of sorts, with whom to discuss the occasionally strange (and often mundane) changes I’m constantly attempting to make in my life, in whatever direction I happen to be exploring at the time. Over nearly three decades, I’ve experimented with a wide variety of media, from classic stationary and blank books, to audio notes, photography, film, sketching. I’ve written in both first and third person, I’ve tried to approach the practice as story telling, as ethnography, as documentary, as art. But my trouble is this… for me, the final product of my efforts is never good enough. I’m constantly shifting tactics and media. I’ve probably made some stationers fairly rich. In fact, any new idea at all can compel me to destroy prior work and start anew, because my sense is that a fresh journaling project is like an opportunity for the redefinition of self. It’s a personal renewal. A cleansing, a chance to make a vow and completely transform the narratives that guide one’s experiences. An old journal, on the other hand, one that no longer accurately reflects my sensibilities or interests in the present, is to me a blemish, an imperfection, a blatant reminder of the self I’ve already outgrown. Such past projects are like carelessly wrought sculptures, beyond repair. And so I must begin, again and again.

Now I know, some may say that for the artist it is the process that matters, not the product. And there are examples from around the world to demonstrate this claim. There are the Tibetan sculptures made from butter, which melt in the sun. The sacred sand-paintings of the Navajo, scooped-up and discarded at the close of their healing ceremonies. Origami cranes, floating down the rivers of Japan. There are all manner of ikitstakssiistsi to look toward as monuments to the significance of process over product. True. I don’t deny it. But these examples involve at least two aspects that my journals do not. First, they are almost always seen to some stage of human completion, each creative act having a very defined conclusion, the point at which they are left in sacrifice to the sacred beings, the ancestors, the future generations. Which brings up the second distinction they have from my journals – these creative acts are also highly spiritual, inaugurating, feeding, or renewing sacred relationships. And while my journaling practices have always nurtured, I’ve never really approached them as offerings to the forces that sustain my life. Rather, and perhaps sadly, I feel deep down that they have been little more than tools for fostering detachment, as if the immediate activities involved in my pursuits for growth and transformation are somehow not enough in themselves. And I’m aware that it is in large part my history of exposure to an immature and ego-centric global ethos that has conditioned me to such hollow practice.

There is another (and related) reason why I tend to discard imperfect or outdated journals, over-concern myself with the organization of items on my shelving systems, fret obsessively over household clutter, etc. It is because I have been enculturated in an aesthetics that defies nature by placing all like items together, and all unalike items apart. It’s a system partial to concrete categories, surface in its emphasis, allowing little room for metamorphoses, transfigurations, or interconnectivities. In fact, it is a way that fears these complexities and the potential loss of present form. A journal, by its very nature of recording a series of thoughts and life experiences, all of which are unalike except by means of their association to a single person in the midst of constant change, somehow simultaneously calls-to and troubles this aesthetics. As typically carried out, a journal is in essence just another means of imposing false order on the flow of life, both by objectifying experience and by organizing its representation into segments of a linear-time framework that is completely removed from the shifting cyclicality of the natural world. My fluent relationship with both kinds of awareness has, in a sense, rendered me bipolar. I strive for a certain level of systematicity, all the while knowing full well that such order reflects an impoverished approach to negotiating the human condition.

Perhaps what I’ve needed all along is a healthy recognition of both the limitations and potential functionalities of record-keeping practices, particularly in the traditions of aokstakio’p and aisinaakio’p… this, followed by an alterative adoption of those beneficial techniques and media from the established global culture, inwardly, in a manner that augments rather than re-shapes niitsitapia’pii. I am lucky, in this sense, to be already engaged in a learning process through iiyaohkimiipaitapiiyssin, which I’m sure will offer many insights along the way. But all the same, I know that to achieve my vision, to revitalize forms of niitsitapi record-keeping through my journaling practice, I will have to work much more closely with those constant resources I can trust - niitsi’powahsin, akaitapiitsinikssiistsi, ki nipaapao’kaanistsi. I will also need to develop a habit of respecting the advice of my own deeper intuition, and begin responding regularly to the voices of the sspommitapiiksi, ksaahkomitapiiksi, and soyiitapiiksi of kitawahsinnoon. My hope is that in blogging the present journal, Akayo’kaki A’pawaawahkaa, I can explore and perhaps realize this interest. And if nothing else, if the urge to renew strikes again, all I have to do is hit DELETE.

Akayo'kaki A'pawaawahkaa

20 December 2008

Mi'kotso'tokaaniksi Aiksikkiaakiyaa

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