TheBanyanTree: Walking to the tree - 2

[sash]

Today we set up camp in anticipation of my arrival - alone - on Tuesday. 
Ed can't get away until Wednesday and couldn't abide the thought of me
arriving and trying to set up on my own.  We also knew that I would rest
easier if I could connect to the land before the ceremony started.

It was a great idea, but when we pulled down the long drive, it was
immediately clear that the ceremony had started without us.

There was just a fraction of the full camp there, but still a buzz of
activity.  Sweet Medicine was struggling with her tent - she is just too
tiny to hold up the poles.  That was a good transition and pulled us right
into the extended family.  We were quickly bustling about - setting up our
tent, organizing the family kitchen that will serve our hoop (Seven
Shields) and Sweet Medicine's hoop with whom we had been asked to camp.

Seven Shields is a small hoop - a younger hoop - the stubborn remains of
several painful fragmentations of a once large and strong community. 
Sweet Medicine leads another group - born of the same large community,
once planted on the other side of a chasm from those who founded Seven
Shields.  Now, though, they look up to see that the enemy of my enemy's
rejected ex-wife's enemy is....wait...let me start again.

No.  I'd rather not.  Once estranged, members of our hoop find welcome
with Sweet Medicine and her family.  The battle was never between the two
groups, and there is no need for bad blood to remain.  Craig and Ed and I
often sweat at the home of Yellow Robe - one of Sweet Medicine's main
students.  It is like visiting your uncles house - not quite home, but
still family - somehow.

So we are camping together.  This kitchen will serve up to 35 people on
the busiest day.  I will be running the kitchen most of the week.  Ed and
I will be the only supporters there for much of the purification time and
the beginning of the dance.  I'm a little overwhelmed but know that this
is a tiny thing - something that will take a small part of my awareness
once I am completely there.

As the camp comes together, I am drawn over to the arbor.  This is the
central stage for the most visible part of the ceremony.

I must add that Sundance is more than a ceremony.  Elders will say "Don't
call it a ceremony.  This is our religion."  I believe this is much as
Christians might say Easter is not just a holiday.  Not just because of
the importance of the day, but because during the course of the gathering,
there are echoes of every element of the Red Road.

It also became clear that the 'ceremony' that is Sundance does not happen
within the oval of the arbor.  That is the manifestation, but everyone
there - even before the days of purification began - was walking in
ceremony.  We were doing holy work and transforming ourselves, the
community, the land, and our world.

The arbor is a large oval shape.  How large  Well - distances were hard to
judge - I could feel my head moving into that other space - where numbers
turn sideways and space is - um - different.  Someone can be holding your
hand and seem ages away or I can turn to Crystal Heart for comfort
although he sleeps on the other side of the country.

So they say the big tipi is 26 feet in diameter.  That seems immense - too
immense.  Let me think.  There were about 25 of us in the community
meeting and we were seated around the interior.  We each had plenty of
room - let's say 3' each for our shoulders and wiggle space.  That would
be about 75' - oh, the door was another 4' across, so 79' or 80' inside
circumference.  Wow - that is about 26' in diameter.  I didn't really
doubt them, but my sense of scale couldn't quite comprehend it.  The pine
poles (Yes they were made of lodgepole pine and don't feel bad.  I've been
around those trees my whole life and I never grokked the name before,
either.) were about 40' long.

So next to the arbor to the West, in the cloistered area for the dancers,
there are three of these tipi - the big one for the medicine tent and two
smaller as changing rooms for the men and women dancers.

If I picture those tipi in the arbor - yeah they would fit side by side
easily.  That would be about 75 feet across the oval then, and not quite
double the other way - maybe 100' or 125'.

So the arbor is an open area about 75'x125'.  It is circled by a double
row of poles - 8' high, that have structure built up and over.  That will
be covered by pine boughs to created a shaded circuit for the supporters
and observers that surround the open area where the dancers will be. 
There is no shade in there.  This is dancing in full sunlight - looking up
at the sun - for 4-6 hours each day.

As a supporter, I will be dancing the same time.  I will be in the shade -
if I want to be.  During the break periods, when the dancers go into the
tipis and rest, I can go to my tent or to the kitchen.  It is my duty to
remain hydrated and well fed.  I cannot be weakened or let my exhaustion
show.  The dancers need to look over and see me healthy and whole and
nourished.  The healers need to know there will be no casualties from the
crowd.

I will be tired most of the week.  I suspect I will lose weigh.  There is
a lot of work to be done.  The fire must be watched at all times. 
Security must be posted.  The East gate must be guarded from dusk until
dawn.  The physical labor and stress and the frequent sweatlodges will
more than burn off the calories I consume.

The dancers will wither before us.  As I sewed the skirt that Najii will
wear to dance, I had to construct it to fit him even if he lost 10-15
pounds in those four short days.  They will not be cutting wood or keeping
the fire or hauling water, but they will be dancing without stop and
without fail.  They will also take on no food nor water for 4 days.

Tonight I sit at my keyboard - my focus held taut between two worlds.  I
will return tomorrow - this time to stay.  My medicine is packed - all but
the walutas that Ed and I have yet to make.  The bundles that will place
our prayers in the tree.

I need to go to the store for ice and water.  I will do that as Ed
finishes stitching the mocassins he is sewing for me.  They are made of an
amazing pale yellow elk hide.  He knows that this beautiful gift, hand
crafted for me, is the only way to convince me to cover my feet during
ceremony.  He is protecting me from myself - from my stubbornness.  I
understand and appreciate it and am touched by how well he knows me.  A
lesser love would have tried to argue for the protection of my feet.  Ed
knows that argument would never have swayed me.

The only way I would cover my feet on that sacred ground would be to wear
these consecrated shoes.  My soul laughs at how clever he is and his love
will enfold and protect every step as I walk toward the tree.

to be continued.....