Sunday Archive II: John Thomas Twofist
Cleaning out three gigs worth of emails is a real trip down memory lane.
Here I am with a beard. And a dog. In a bathrobe, at Christmas. And my aunt smirking in the background (drunk):
This article made it onto the GS front page…two versions ago, I think. GS has been around since 2001, in one form or another, and there are plenty of articles that have been lost in the shuffle.
This is from 2004, and I ran a brief series of articles writing as “John Thomas Two-Fist.” They were purely vodka fueled.
The Word for Earth is Earth
My name is John Thomas Twofist. Many of you read my last article and wrote that I was insulting. The truth is, I am half Cherokee, half Irish and half Polish and only those who speak from a place of white privilege are insulted. It is this false “political correctness” that has polluted the mind of the Anglo and made him into a pandering, fork-tongued devil.
When I lived in Encino with my treacherous sister, I realized many things. One was the True Blood that filled my body. The Cherokee blood. I set out to learn our Language and now wish to tell you the most magical of Cherokee words. The word for Earth. Unfortunately, I was not allowed to use the correct font so I cannot write this word. It sounds like “elohi” and it is written with a sort of squiggly capital R, followed by a G and then a symbol that doesn’t look like anything, really. That is the word for Earth.
My people have a legend. In the legend, the great Mother Spirit, who built the earth from her lungs, selects a young brave to be her spokesperson. The brave is the weakest boy in the tribe, and many of the tribe mock him. When he returns and speaks for the Mother Spirit, no one heeds him. The Mother Spirit told him to say that a Great Wind was coming. My people believe that a Great Wind comes once a generation and sweeps away the souls of the dead. If you are not cautious, you may become trapped in the Great Wind and vanish forever. The Brave, whose name was Running Deer, which sounds like “atsvsti awi,” was forced to the Supper Tent by the elders where he was told to be silent about the Mother Spirit and prepare the meal for the tribe. It is customary for the tribe to eat together and bond, a practice forbidden by the Anglo. Then a squaw, whose name was Crippled Horse, or “Uyotsvhi soquili,” came to him.
“I believe in your words,” Crippled Horse said to him. Her mouth was large, and her face had a scarred lip. She was not beautiful, but Running Deer looked in her eyes and saw something he recognized.
“I am glad you believe,” Running Deer said to Crippled Horse.
Crippled Horse lifted her dress and lay for Running Deer. He pushed apart her legs and moved down to be on top of her, undoing his breeches. This sexual position was adopted by the Anglos, not the other way around like they claim in the White Privilege history texts.
When Running Deer entered Crippled Horse, Crippled Horse said, “Let the Mother Spirit enter me.”
Running Deer then became the Mother Spirit and he felt a great pressure on his penis. As Mother Spirit and Crippled Horse bonded, Running Deer realized what had happened and tried to rip himself from Crippled Horse, but her sex closed upon him and tore his penis away.
Crippled horse then stood, letting her dress fall back down, and she said to Running Deer, “You were not yet ready for the Mother Spirit.”
When the elders found Running Deer, he had died from bleeding to death. Crippled Horse was nowhere to be found and, within one sun – what we call a day – no one remembered Crippled Horse. Then the Great Wind came and many were taken for they heeded not the warnings of the Mother Spirit.
In Cherokee tradition, the Earth, or Mother Spirit, is a living creature. The oceans and rivers are like blood, the sky like eyes and the tree roots like feet. It is the Anglo who does not heed the Mother Spirit’s warning and, so, like Running Deer, the Anglo will be emasculated by Crippled Horse. It is only a matter of time.
I live in Kansas, which is the Anglo name for “Ayatena Gasohi.” I live in my girlfriend’s apartment in a small, rural area. She is one quarter Iowa. Not the state, the tribe. She drives to White Cloud each day to work with the Iowa of Kansas Executive Committee. It is she who reminded me of the Tale of the Mother Spirit when I started working on this column. We had been fighting because I am currently unemployed, through no fault of my own, and I am jealous because she sometimes stays at the Best Western in White Cloud. The recent winter storm in the Midwest means that she must stay in White Cloud on the weekends and sometimes the Best Western is full so she stays with traveling businessmen kind enough to put her up. At first, I misinterpreted the situation, but I am hot headed. Once she explained the extenuating circumstances, and assured me that her boss at the Committee vouched for these individuals, I relaxed.
My girlfriend is very pretty and I do not like to be gone from her for long, but any friend of the Iowa is a friend of mine and learning to not be sexually possessive is the lesson taught in the Tale of Running Deer. It is a lesson we all should learn. I tell you this from the heart.
Thank you for reading. May the Earth walk with you in light.
© John Thomas Twofist