Cobell checks and Skoal tins: How we do Thanksgiving in Indian Country

Gratitude is like a warm, fuzzy blanket.

There is a natural reluctance to gratitude that comes at virtually any age. Ask a toddler if they are grateful for their juice box and the blank looks rival the same ones a teenager gives if you ask them if they appreciate the ten spot you gave them last week. A facial expression is worth a thousand words.

This is normal, however. I can’t recall all the things I should be grateful for but I can work on it.

I read with great interest the origins of November as Native American Heritage Month. Outside of Indian country, not too many people are going to pay heed to the designation. But within our ranks, we know it and marinate in it for thirty days or so before the headlong rush into the holiday season. We really have no choice in either; both carry us away as if by a raging current.

Someone posited that Indian heritage month was more akin to an act of political correctness than a genuine motion to consider the beleaguered existence Natives have had over the past two hundred-plus years as dependent domestic nations of the United States. Kind of like; the children were kidnapped, the lands absorbed, the languages reviled and the traditions ransacked but here is a month to show that we really care.

It is what it is. On the one hand, Indians managed to take the stray ends of their heritage and weave them together in a kind of pan-Indian tapestry. This serves a purpose, much like the pow-wow. Indians can load up the car, drive from one end of the country to the other, get out, set up chairs and understand the doings from Navajo to Seminole. This cultivated Indian observance allows us to feel dignity and cohesion in one fell swoop. It’s got Native stamped all over it.

From the earliest days of interaction with the Europeans, Indians have learned to take the best of what Anglo culture had to offer and weave it into one- of-a-kind items. Some might call this acculturation while others might call it adaptation. Nonetheless, today Skoal can lids became the centerpieces of shimmering jingle dress regalia and forty-nine songs are perfect for YouTube. The examples are ingenious and numerous.

Take Thanksgiving, for example. Indians know that the very day of celebration may not have sprouted if the ancestors were not moved to compassion for the visitors who could scarcely stay warm or feed themselves. The exact details may be sketchy but it can be said with some degree of confidence that America would not have a day-long turkey binge if it were not for its introduction by the Indian Samaritans.

So now, on this approaching holiday, Indians will take the questionable day (I used to wear all black for years) and mold it once again into something that suits our purposes. Somewhere in Indian country, the oldest elder in our bunch will say a prayer of Thanksgiving that will be tinged in tears. And we’ll remember all the things we should be grateful for, like Cobell checks. Family feasts will be served with fry bread and turkey. Football might be played, tribal politics dissected and leftovers will go in baggies. 

In short, we become our own touchstones. Indians have a war weary knowledge that they aren’t exactly like other people celebrating Thanksgiving. Let’s face it, the pilgrims are long gone but the Indians are still here.  Native folks have given the most and seemingly received the least. But they carry on. This is how to do Thanksgiving in Indian country.

S.E. Ruckman is a citizen of the Wichita and Affiliated Tribes of Oklahoma. She is a graduate of the University of Oklahoma’s school of journalism and a 2014 National Health Journalism Fellow from the University of Southern California (USC).