In June I had the fortuity of traveling through the vast expanse of historic territory that is South Dakota. It is a state with a population of 812,383 (2009) and contains seven severed reservations, cut-up squares where the Oglala Sioux people now live. In the southwest corner of the state there is a reservation called Pine Ridge Agency which sits in the barren expanse east of the sacred Black Hills, and stretches north to the dramatic temper of the Badlands - the place where the Lakota Ghost Dances were before soldiers prohibited them. The tragic history there runs as deep as the landscape so aptly named. But the most devastating part of the story is written in the faces of youth today, whose dream might be just to live beyond 50.
Badlands, Rebecca Thom, 2011
"...And we made these little gray houses of logs that you see, and they are square. It is a bad way to live, for there can be no power in a square. You have noticed that everything an Indian does is in a circle, and that is because the Power of the World always works in circles, and everything tries to be round. In the old days when we were a strong and happy people, all our power came to us from the sacred hoop of the nation, and so long as the hoop was unbroken, the people flourished."
- Black Elk Speaks
We drove down to Pine Ridge one day in order to visit the burial ground and memorial center of the 1890 Massacre at Wounded Knee, in which hundreds of innocent Lakota people, including women and children were shot and killed by soldiers one snowy day. The burial site is a mass grave on the top of a windy hill, surrounded by chain-link fencing and other graves of people that died too young. At the bottom of the hill there is a circular building, the 'museum.' Despite daylight, inside the rotunda you could hardly read the story under one naked light bulb that hung from the middle. The tragedy is pieced together through prints of photos, hand written cardboard and painting on the wall. It is hardly a museum, but a relic of the devastation - of the thievery that has occurred amidst these people. Four young men stood at the entrance, welcoming us, urging us to buy one of their hand crafted drums or dreamcatchers - neither with any authentic appeal. They were desperate, but quiet. One of them was highly informed, yet shy. Another of them was drunk, yet intently sober - he was the one who sat with us outside and spoke.
We rolled our tobacco and then offered it to them because that is what you do. Then, over a cigarette this young guy in his early twenties, with a face scarred with acne and anguish, described life on the Res. He started out with words of gratitude for the greenness of the rolling hills that surrounded us as only a slight portion of the Native land is any good for anything, the landscape is usually harsh browns or white with snow. But this summer the rain had been a plenty and the land was bright and lively. A sickly looking dog slept below us, a bootlegger passed by selling alcohol out of his mini van (alcohol is illegal on the Reservation) and the young man continued on, his breath smelling thick of booze, he spoke slowly. He told us that he worries for his sisters, he fears they'll commit suicide. He described the other ways that people live and die there; Cancer is rife and the hospital care is poor, alcoholism takes people if they don't go first in car accidents. We asked him his dream and he went quiet for a while,
"I guess it's to live longer. You know, live beyond 50."
