#IndigenousPeoplesDay2018

It is the start of the second week of October. According to A Sand County Almanac, it is the month of ruffed grouse, woodcock, smoky gold tamaracks, hunting, geese, early mornings, "red lanterns," partridge (grouse) dogs and saplings scraped by whitetail bucks troubled by itchy, velvet-covered antlers. If you've never read A Sand County, try it and start with October. You'll soon know lots more about why we love this month so much.

"smoky gold tamaracks"

Photo by J. Harrington

Yet another reason we enjoy this month is that October 8 is Indigenous Peoples' Day on our calendar. Earlier today we came across a Letter from Indigenous Activists in the Sierra Club magazine on line. We included a link because we believe it would be worth your time and effort to read it. We'll be here when you get back. (You do know how to use your browser's "Back" button, right?)

Native American Community Clinic in the American Indian Cultural Corridor

Photo by J. Harrington

[UPDATE: Listen To A 'Native American Poets Playlist' For Indigenous People's Day, At Harvard's Peabody Museum. We're part way through reading the Heid Erdrich anthology, published by Milkweed Books, on which the Playlist is based.]

Today is also the day that much of main stream media and social media ae discussing and commenting on a new report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Global Warming of 1.5 °C an IPCC special report on the impacts of global warming of 1.5 °C above pre-industrial levels and related global greenhouse gas emission pathways, in the context of strengthening the global response to the threat of climate change, sustainable development, and efforts to eradicate poverty. If we believed in coincidence, we'd think that the release of the report's Summary for Policy Makers on or about Indigenous Peoples' Day was a coincidence. More and more people are raising serious concerns about the (in)compatibility of capitalism, its dependance on perpetual growth, and a sustainable future. The limitations and errors of colonialism are being flagged more and more in works such as An Indigenous People’s History of the United States.

We're both surprised and disappointed that there seem to be few, if any, mentions of Drawdown, the most comprehensive plan ever proposed to reverse global warming, in coverage of the IPCC report. It seems to us that one of the first steps in taking a whole systems approach to complex problems is to complete due diligence. The second is to connect the dots. We've seen too little evidence of either of these steps being taken by either main stream media or the Democrats. (We have no expectation of Republicans taking either step.) In fact, the Democrats seem to have included responding to global warming and "protecting the environment" right up there with "g_d, motherhood and apple pie" as something they think we should do something about. How we're going to "get 'er done," and what priority those actions should have gets a little less specific. We wonder if any Democrats have actually read "Drawdown." Improving diversified family farms and rural economies rank, or should rank, right up there with "becoming a clean energy superpower."

The Powwow at the End of the World

By Sherman Alexie

I am told by many of you that I must forgive and so I shall   

after an Indian woman puts her shoulder to the Grand Coulee Dam   

and topples it. I am told by many of you that I must forgive   

and so I shall after the floodwaters burst each successive dam   

downriver from the Grand Coulee. I am told by many of you   

that I must forgive and so I shall after the floodwaters find   

their way to the mouth of the Columbia River as it enters the Pacific   

and causes all of it to rise. I am told by many of you that I must forgive   

and so I shall after the first drop of floodwater is swallowed by that salmon   

waiting in the Pacific. I am told by many of you that I must forgive and so I shall   

after that salmon swims upstream, through the mouth of the Columbia   

and then past the flooded cities, broken dams and abandoned reactors   

of Hanford. I am told by many of you that I must forgive and so I shall   

after that salmon swims through the mouth of the Spokane River   

as it meets the Columbia, then upstream, until it arrives   

in the shallows of a secret bay on the reservation where I wait alone.   

I am told by many of you that I must forgive and so I shall after   

that salmon leaps into the night air above the water, throws   

a lightning bolt at the brush near my feet, and starts the fire   

which will lead all of the lost Indians home. I am told   

by many of you that I must forgive and so I shall   

after we Indians have gathered around the fire with that salmon   

who has three stories it must tell before sunrise: one story will teach us   

how to pray; another story will make us laugh for hours;   

the third story will give us reason to dance. I am told by many   

of you that I must forgive and so I shall when I am dancing   

with my tribe during the powwow at the end of the world.

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