Ambivalence

As I drove my rental car across the gently rolling hills of southeastern Montana, I decided it was a good time to check my voice mail. I was away from Bluff pursuing the legal part of my schizophrenic trading post lawyer life and needed to check in. The message from my sister Cindy informed me that late the previous evening my brother Craig had rolled his pickup truck three and one-half times. The cause: reaching for his cell phone while he was driving. Cindy's message went on to say that Craig was okay, but that it might be a good idea to call and talk with him.

Since I was in Montana working on a tragic wrongful death case, I was well aware how thin the line between life and death can be. Although I have never seen the movie, I have always been fascinated by the film title, Six Degrees of Separation. I have often thought of that movie and how the title can easily be restructured to address the line between life and death, which is frequently a matter of only a few moments of separation. If you are lucky, as Craig was, you live; if you are unlucky, as the mother of my clients had been, you don't.

Since I had been retained as attorney for the family, I had been greatly disturbed by the randomness of the accident which took this woman's life. I quickly realized that circumstances that are far removed from your day to day existence can set in motion a chain of events that robs you of your life, your health or your loved ones. Craig had been fortunate; he was wearing his seat belt and had escaped with only a bruised ego, a dent in his pocket book and a few minor cuts and scrapes. When I reached him by telephone he was back at work and in good spirits.

Mortality seemed to be the theme of the day, however, since I was on my way to Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument. Although I have been in Montana several times over the last two years as a result of this case, I had never taken the time to visit what I had always known as "Custer's Last Stand." Since this was to be one of my last trips to the area before the case was resolved, I decided it was time to satisfy my curiosity.

As I entered the Crow Agency, which is were the monument is located, I was reminded of many experiences I have had with the Navajo people who come to the trading post. On the surface at least, the parallels between the Crow Agency and the Navajo Reservation seemed striking. As I approached the monument entrance, the ambivalence of the place was almost palpable. I remember thinking that the social, racial and political issues associated with this land were still unsettled.

Over 125 years ago, many United States soldiers and Indian warriors had lost their lives on this land in two tragic days of fighting. Was it a victory for the Lakota, Cheyenne and Arapaho warriors whose people were subsequently sent to reservations in spite of the 7th Cavalry's dramatic and stunning defeat, or was it just one more tragedy in the ongoing cultural struggle between Native Americans and Anglos? I wasn't sure, and no one else seemed to know either. I couldn't decide whether Chief Sitting Bull, who lived to see his people suffer the indignity of losing their traditional way of life, was more or less fortunate than Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer, whose suffering ended in the dust and blood of the battlefield under that bright mid-June sun.

The Park Service brochure advised me, "The Battle of the Little Bighorn continues to fascinate people around the world. For most, it has come to illustrate a part of what Americans know as their western heritage. Heroism and suffering, brashness and humiliation, victory and defeat, triumph and tragedy - these are the things people come to ponder." I found myself desperately confused while trying to decide where to apply those terms.

The Park Service brochure gave me a certain measure of comfort that I was not the only one baffled by this place, and by the differences between the two cultures. It also made me aware that all these same emotions have come to me while working at the trading post. I frequently don't know whether I am the winner or the loser, whether I have been sensitive or insensitive to the needs of my Navajo friends and whether I will ever understand the relationship between the Anglo and Native American cultures. I worry about those and many, many other issues that arise at the trading post on a daily basis.

As I gazed out over the winter brown grass blanketing the rolling hills of the Little Bighorn and the graves of fallen soldiers (the warriors were all removed from the battlefield by their comrades and given traditional burials, leaving only the soldiers), I was struck by the beauty and sadness of the valley. It seemed that the lives of the warriors and soldiers had been needlessly shortened. I was convinced that all the participants had firmly believed they were doing the right thing, but were they? Had all this fighting really made things better? I didn't think so.

My mind kept skipping back and forth between the setting sun and the people of the trading post. Barry and I try to understand and bridge the cultural divide between the Native American and Anglo cultures, but it seems that we frequently stumble over the subtleties, and wind up sprawling face down in the mess.

After a recent article about St. Christopher's mission, we received a message from one of our Navajo friends which concerned me a great deal. I wrote back to inquire whether we had once again taken a misstep. Our friend assured me that we hadn't, but I still wondered. I find myself loving the art and the people, but being more than a little uncomfortable about how to approach certain relationships.

Barry and I have banned all guns and knives from the trading post and designated it a nuclear free zone in an effort to keep things calm. We believe this will help keep the mortality rate low.

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