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Well, it's exactly what it says on the can.

Sometimes, I don't have pictures to share, but I do have thoughts. Hence, the Standard Blog (tm)!

I feel like things are getting away from me again. Like even if I tell someone that I do or don't want to do something, it doesn't matter and I do it anyway. Maybe it's just because I'm a people pleaser. I don't know. Like, my friend runs a sweat lodge for indigenous folks recovering from alcohol and substance abuse, and i've been helping her for two years. I'm both a participant and the Fire Keeper, but it's really just not something i'm drawn to continue. I told her that when we stop for winter, that I'm going to step away from it, wholesale.

It's something I actively dread, it eats up a whole day of my weekend (6 AM to as late as 5, sometimes) and it's an all the time committment that I just do not jump up and down in joy for. I already have a job, and at least with that my instructions are laid out and I get paid. All I get from this is a migraine. I should not want to walk the other way when I see my friend on the street, and I should not feel my stomach drop when I get a text message from her. Anyway, I feel like all she got from that conversation was "if Missymar's migraines go away, she will be able to continue", which was NOT the point of this all. So, after my last sweat two weeks ago, I had to show up last weekend and spent the whole day moving firewood and burning the sweat lodge because we're building a new lodge with the new leader instead of just finishing out the last four months with this one. Okay, fine, cool. This is not a tradition I was raised in, so I really have no say on how things are run. I'm just here for the ride.

Now, what I got from this, is that she's still setting me up to learn how to run my own lodge. It really feels like she fully believes that I am going to change my mind and keep doing this. And by god, if i don't keep my spine stiff, I probably will.

Honestly, I am conflicted. Not every indigenous person gets a chance to learn how to run a sweat lodge, especially not a reconnecting person like me. Sweat Lodge is BIG medicine! It is such an honor to be chosen, to be taught, and to be guided so that you can heal your people and pray with the Ancestors. This is a BIG ASS DEAL, and I know it. But... It's kinda teetering into resentment on my part, and with that feeling, I know that I would not be in the right mindset to do this.

I never asked for this.

Literally.

Two years ago, I was thinking about putting in a job application somewhere and was having trouble making the choice. I asked my oracle deck* for guidance, and pulled the Sweat Lodge card. Well, I reached out to my friend to see if she still did sweats, and she did, one was that upcoming weekend. I went, I sweated, I prayed. It was intense, but it was okay. I never asked her when the next one was happening. I never expressed interest in learning the ins and outs of ceremony. What followed was messages about the next upcoming sweat, and then texts about when I was showing up. Then I was showing up, and she was having me help her start the fire, and lay out the tobacco, and cover up the lodge in blankets. Then she was trying to teach me how to light the fire on my own, and what to do for a lodge of my own. Then it was gathering more willow for the new lodge of the year, and rebuilding it, then getting bitched at because I couldn't drop everything at the drop of a hat to do ceremony in the middle of the week because "When and elder tells you it's time, you do it". And over and over, one thing after another, another piece of straw on the back, another thing for me to do because I'm young and strong and because "How else are you going to run your lodge one day?", another misunderstanding because she doesn't know how to communicate and thinks that "Letting people make mistakes to learn how to do things right" and "Not telling people how to do anything at all and getting mad at them for not doing things right" are the same thing.

Never. Asked.

I'm tired of this, and I am done, but I hope I keep my resolve. No more willow gathering, no more fires, no gathering grandfathers this spring, none of it. None of it I say, as I have it in the books for next monday to go help the new leader gather willow and build the new lodge. And that's another thing! I see my mom once a week, usually on mondays, because sundays are the only common day off I have with my partner.

As of writing this, I haven't seen my mom's face in a month. Hell, I had to call her on the phone just so I could stop feeling guilty and to let her know that it was nothing she had done, I... I just kept... prioritizing other things over her. She's my only mom. I'm her only kid within driving distance, and I spent YEARS not having her nearby. She only has one friend in the area. I don't want to walk out of ceremony to a missed phonecall telling me that if I had visited her that day like I was supposed to, I could have seen her one last time. (I'm going to try to work in mid-week visits soon, but that's neither here nor there.)

Anyway, It's getting late enough that technically I should edit the publish date, so I should go to bed. I guess the TL;DR comes down to: "I'm weak, ungrateful, and also neglectful".

toodles.

*The Lakota Sweat Lodge cards are the only Native American themed oracle cards I have ever found that didn't give me the new-age ick.