I was going to go to Pikani, the long weekend in August. I was so excited to be able to go to one again. I was invited to dance in in the Grand Entry, after lunch. But then, I lost my daughter and so I cannot go because I am grieving. I can go next year. I was making a ribbon skirt and having a bad time completing it. My sewing machine would not work; one thing after another, the bobbin would not go in properly; the danged thing started sewing backwards. And, it hit me. If course I canto complete it. I should not even be working on it right now. I am grieving. And so, I put away my machine, my unfinished ribbon skirt, the regalia things I had bought to wear. More sadness came over me. Now I mourned even the inability to participate in sacred cultural activity to honor my “family’s” matriarch. I wrapped my shawl around me, smudged, smudged all the things I had collected, and put everything away and covered it all with my shawl. This is a good time to explain the shawl to you.
It is proper etiquette to wear a shawl when entering the dance arena. The shawl can be as elaborate as you care to have it. I was gifted mine as a sacred gift of respect and shows how cherished you are. The shawl represents protection and the fringe, all shawls have, sways to the dance beat of the drum. The fringe represents the tears of a woman; her strength, her beauty, her solidarity with all women. The shawl is symbolic of the tipi.
I have been longing for ceremony. I have been longing to wrap the shawl around me and feel the compassion and comfort of Mother Earth’s loving arms and embrace. I have missed the joy and the goodness of sharing tradition with those who have taken me and my children as family. I have missed the sacred path I walked for many years.
The wrapping of a shawl around a woman is representative of wrapping the tipi around the tipi poles. When wearing a shawl, a woman represents the comfort of a woman in her home, praying, nurturing, caring for her family, feeding sacred prepared foods to those who are welcomed within.
When I lived in Maine, I was honored to be asked to give the sacred ancestral hug to the poets at the convention. I took time to prepare and protect myself, then stepped to each person in the circle and held them within my shawl. It was such a moving experience. When I wear my shawl, all the sacred ceremonies come back to me and I feel protected and ‘woman proud’. How I have longed for such again.
©Carol Desjarlais 7.24.23
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