GREAT WALRUS ATTENDS SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA POW-WOW

THE JINGLING BELLS DANCE

Great Walrus is an Indian Brave who is long past his prime.  For the first time in his life he was able to attend a real-life Pow Wow of pure ethnic Native Americans.  Great Walrus was officially given his name by a Narragansett Indian during a small campfire site pow-wow at a reservation situated on the shores of majestic Mascoma Lake in New Hampshire.  This reservation was privately owned by the Missionaries of Our Lady of LaSalette and was the site of an exclusive summer camp for boys who came from New England, New York and New Jersey to get away from the urban life that they led during the other ten months of the year. Great Walrus was a daring brave.  He could enjoy the chilly waters of Mascoma Lake beginning from the middle of May and into the early part of September.  His bravery was rewarded when he was given his headband, Rhode Island Red Rooster Tail feather and his name during the above stated event.  Though the headband and feather have long since disappeared, Great Walrus still carries his name proudly.

Today was especially remarkable because so many American Indians came together to celebrate family, friends, alliances, stories, dances and friendly drumming, singing and dance competitions.  Young and old were joined together in a six hour celebration of cultural unity.  It is an experience that I will never forget.  I had many thoughts run through my head and my heart this afternoon.  Let me just throw out the most daring and the most powerful.  I am convinced that I was looking at an image of the people of the Bible.  I was present at a venue where the activities were the commemoration of rituals that go back multiple thousands of years.  I was witnessing human memory at its strongest.  I was witnessing TRADITION like few of us ever experience.  The rituals were being practiced by young and old alike in a community that respected them all with equal dignity.  The music was created by the simplest and oldest of instruments, the drum and the human voice.  I saw all this take place in a spirit of unity on a plot of land dedicated to such rituals by the people who once roamed this land in unfettered freedom.  For six hours on this day, these sa...es celebrated centuries of culture in tranquil community.  This celebration, and others to follow all around North America during this Summer Season, keep the reality of the holiness of the land alive before them and before those of us who care to celebrate it.  I have been reborn, a new child of the Land that I love...Not the U.S.A. ... The land of God and of the North American Native.