This is absolutely stunning. I am so glad I found it. I have several people to share this compassionate story with - not only for its specific details, but for its larger application. Thank you!
Sherman, I am working on a piece for 🍁Leaves regarding my two fathers- one that abandoned us and one that was a self-righteous drunkard. Would it be possible to include your poem "How Do We Forgive Our Fathers" in my Substack post, with citation, of course? It exactly represents my own conflict, and is so moving to me. If permission is not possible, I understand. I thank you for considering my request. Sharron
Thanks. fyi - Sebastian Junger, who wrote The Perfect Storm: A True Story of Men and the Sea, has begun to share his faith. His book Tribe: On Homecoming and Belonging opens with Junger describing his personal encounter with someone whom he thought was an angel while backpacking.
I am a bit surprised that the term "Indian" is used to refer to the various pre-european tribes of the Americas -- by people who are ethnically descended from those tribes. Is this common? I figured it would be commonly taken as offensively ignorant.
This makes me stop. As a young woman, I consciously developed a strong handshake. I worked not to crush or sprain, but I've been told it's a firm shake. Especially when I was young, short and rather tiny, I wanted not to be taken for granted.
Thank you for this. Once again, your words are making me think. To reconsider. I'm old now! I'm hoary of head. Should I still have to feel this way... ?!
This handshake dominance thing also reminds me of all those clips of Trump using a handshake as an opportunity to pull people off balance. then he met Trudeau who was ready and braced and that was sure satisfying to watch. Back in the 80's I met some Russian visitors and was warned that they grip as hard as they can. No joke, it was painful.
The first tribe had a problem. With no language, they basically hung out for 2 million years. What they did, no one knows. Finally, a Glee Club was formed, and here we are.
How tragic, that an act of trust and warmth between strangers must often be recalibrated in anticipation of reciprocity turning into a show of dominance. Couldn't we seek a world where a kind of Esperanto of gesture superseded expressions of dominance? I especially like your descriptions of strangers meeting and trusting each other, as in a sketch earlier this summer of meeting a wary man in a late night diner. Vivid and hopeful.
They say that being able to code switch in language is one of the most complex languages there is. I wonder if anyone has studied the physical effects?
Sep 1, 2022·edited Sep 1, 2022Liked by Sherman Alexie
I recognize this feeling. Many years ago, while in a crowded subway in NY, I overheard a woman ask for directions with an accent I recognized to be from the country of my childhood. We started chatting, two complete strangers, about the situation "back home", in a police state behind (at the time) the Iron Curtain. The touching part of this memory is that after the woman went away, my American boyfriend, who had been by my side all along, watching me chatter away in a foreign language with a complete stranger, smiled and told me that my body language, while talking with this member of my old tribe, had changed completely. We were touching arms, staring directly into each other's eyes, our faces just inches away from each other. It was not so much that we connected because we had grown up in the same place, it was that the foreign language we had used was infinitely more complex than merely the spoken language. It incorporated all the ways our bodies danced in our interaction.
In an interview you once gave, you pointed out something that always stayed with me: when people speak face to face, they interact on countless levels, even smelling one another. So too with our different languages. We each have connections to a myriad different tribes, and when we interact with members of those same tribes, we change a lot more than our spoken language, our bodies speak differently too. Those handshakes you describe... what a wonderful way to connect and speak a range of emotions with our bodies.
Thank you for this story. It is beautiful that even though you're from different tribes, different places, you still shared a common custom that those outside of the Native American world most likely wouldn't recognize. As a woman who has often worked in a male dominated field, it has always been interesting to me to observe how men shake my hand. I was always raised to have a 'firm, confident' handshake to show that I can hold my own in a man's world (no pun intended).
This is absolutely stunning. I am so glad I found it. I have several people to share this compassionate story with - not only for its specific details, but for its larger application. Thank you!
Sherman, I am working on a piece for 🍁Leaves regarding my two fathers- one that abandoned us and one that was a self-righteous drunkard. Would it be possible to include your poem "How Do We Forgive Our Fathers" in my Substack post, with citation, of course? It exactly represents my own conflict, and is so moving to me. If permission is not possible, I understand. I thank you for considering my request. Sharron
Thanks. fyi - Sebastian Junger, who wrote The Perfect Storm: A True Story of Men and the Sea, has begun to share his faith. His book Tribe: On Homecoming and Belonging opens with Junger describing his personal encounter with someone whom he thought was an angel while backpacking.
his activism stance: pro-health care for veterans
I am a bit surprised that the term "Indian" is used to refer to the various pre-european tribes of the Americas -- by people who are ethnically descended from those tribes. Is this common? I figured it would be commonly taken as offensively ignorant.
reading aloud to the Georgia Environmental Protection Division (EPD) in Atlanta https://youtu.be/0anf_H37LLo
Powerful story. Great reminder to stay human.
This makes me stop. As a young woman, I consciously developed a strong handshake. I worked not to crush or sprain, but I've been told it's a firm shake. Especially when I was young, short and rather tiny, I wanted not to be taken for granted.
Thank you for this. Once again, your words are making me think. To reconsider. I'm old now! I'm hoary of head. Should I still have to feel this way... ?!
Tenderness vs. Force
You never stop learning about other people, other tribes. Before this post, I thought a handshake was just a handshake. Thanks for the insight!
This handshake dominance thing also reminds me of all those clips of Trump using a handshake as an opportunity to pull people off balance. then he met Trudeau who was ready and braced and that was sure satisfying to watch. Back in the 80's I met some Russian visitors and was warned that they grip as hard as they can. No joke, it was painful.
The first tribe had a problem. With no language, they basically hung out for 2 million years. What they did, no one knows. Finally, a Glee Club was formed, and here we are.
It is interesting to me when a word or theme keeps returning in my life. Tenderness has been haunting me all this week. Thank you for adding to that .
Thanks. LOL. Posted reminder of Vine Deloria, Jr. saying, "most of the people shouting on these marches and things were undercover agents." It's especially important, these days. https://www.geoengineeringwatch.org/geoengineering-watch-global-alert-news-may-18-2019-197/#comment-1319422
How tragic, that an act of trust and warmth between strangers must often be recalibrated in anticipation of reciprocity turning into a show of dominance. Couldn't we seek a world where a kind of Esperanto of gesture superseded expressions of dominance? I especially like your descriptions of strangers meeting and trusting each other, as in a sketch earlier this summer of meeting a wary man in a late night diner. Vivid and hopeful.
They say that being able to code switch in language is one of the most complex languages there is. I wonder if anyone has studied the physical effects?
I recognize this feeling. Many years ago, while in a crowded subway in NY, I overheard a woman ask for directions with an accent I recognized to be from the country of my childhood. We started chatting, two complete strangers, about the situation "back home", in a police state behind (at the time) the Iron Curtain. The touching part of this memory is that after the woman went away, my American boyfriend, who had been by my side all along, watching me chatter away in a foreign language with a complete stranger, smiled and told me that my body language, while talking with this member of my old tribe, had changed completely. We were touching arms, staring directly into each other's eyes, our faces just inches away from each other. It was not so much that we connected because we had grown up in the same place, it was that the foreign language we had used was infinitely more complex than merely the spoken language. It incorporated all the ways our bodies danced in our interaction.
In an interview you once gave, you pointed out something that always stayed with me: when people speak face to face, they interact on countless levels, even smelling one another. So too with our different languages. We each have connections to a myriad different tribes, and when we interact with members of those same tribes, we change a lot more than our spoken language, our bodies speak differently too. Those handshakes you describe... what a wonderful way to connect and speak a range of emotions with our bodies.
Thank you for this story. It is beautiful that even though you're from different tribes, different places, you still shared a common custom that those outside of the Native American world most likely wouldn't recognize. As a woman who has often worked in a male dominated field, it has always been interesting to me to observe how men shake my hand. I was always raised to have a 'firm, confident' handshake to show that I can hold my own in a man's world (no pun intended).