Hello from Texas,
I am the blonde wife of a full blood Native American who is condemned to death in Arizona for a crime that he did not commit. My husband practices the Lakota Traditions of his grandmother, so when I ran across your site it seemed a good place to possibly learn about what is authentic and what is not.
My first question since I am here is concerning how those of you who are Native American feel if someone such as myself chooses to follow her husband's beliefs. I greatly respect what I learn from Eldon and he encourages me to learn more and to trust what I learn and what I feel to be. Because I read so much online where others are against white people practicing the Traditions, I feel sometimes that I am stepping on toes, when I don't intend to, though.
My husband believes that that our union was meant to be and that we are meant to learn together in this life many things. However, we have faced prejudice against his marrying a white by some of his family already. Ironically, these family members knowing he was innocent were willing to leave him incarcerated and never try to assist him to get out, because they feared someone would learn they had a family member on the row. Then, they turn on him for marrying a woman who believes in him and fights tooth and nail to see him come home.
I do not attend any ceremonies and would not without I knew they were authentic in origin as it seems to me I wouldn't learn very much if I follow fools rather than those of the way that my husband follows. We do hope that Eldon will be home someday and we have an innocence project trying to help us get there. I expect that I will then attend ceremonies and other events with my husband, but wonder how many will feel that I have no place there.
Eldon was actually a little afraid, when we first got into discussing religion, because I was white and he enjoyed my company, but had lost other pen pals who wanted to save his savage soul. He made the offer that he would understand if I didn't write anymore if his beliefs bothered me, when he first told me of practicing the Traditions. He was pleasantly surprised to learn that I did not consider him a heathen as others had called it. What we found is though I never labeled my beliefs I did believe really close to what he believes, when I found him.
A connection to the natural world was more or less born with me and I never called what I knew to be God anything other than God before we met, because Christianity scared me to death from the time that I was a child. Since finding Eldon I have had beautiful experiences with hawks having came to me in magnificent and unexplainable ways, butterflies in droves at some of the hardest moments of my life and other unbelievable experiences. I also have a connection to my husband with even thirteen hundred miles between us that is uncanny. He says that there is strong medicine between us. I usually call it magic, but is certainly a healing power.
Occasionally, I smudge and this began at my husband's suggestion. The first gift that he managed to get to me was a very small amount of his own sage sent through the mail.Though I do not understand as much as I should, I respect the practice and he likes knowing that we share at least that small thing.
Eldon is my only human teacher, other than the books that I read, but I feel that I learn from the world around me continually. I also expect that if I am meant to learn from an elder that this person will be provided as was my husband. They will come by design of the Mystery that guides all of our lives.
And after this long winded introduction to my place in life, there is a question. Am I wrong to follow my husband, though I cannot tell you whether or not there is even a drop of Native American blood in my past only that I respect the man I married and the beliefs that he follows?
