P.G. YMCA Indian Guides and Princesses
Bowie, Maryland

November 2002                                          Patuxent Nation

Welcome back to both returning Guides and Princesses as well as to those new Indians joining our Nation!  We have a very exciting year ahead of us.  I am looking so forward to all of the events we’ll be doing.

I saw many of you at the Induction Ceremony/campfire a couple of weeks ago.  It was such a beautiful evening.   Did you get a chance that night to see some bats flying around at the Y?  Bats really aren’t that creepy.  They are actually very good to have around.  One of their favorite things to eat are mosquitoes.  Did you know that one little bat can eat up to 600 mosquitoes an hour?   We have a bat house in our yard.  If you get the chance to come over, we’ll show you our bat house.  Unfortunately, we don’t have any bats staying in it. 

Early in  September was  the Inaugural PowWow on the mall.  It was an exciting event to go to.  My family went to the PowWow with Princess Tiger Lily (Naomi) and Bald Eagle (Norm).    It was a huge event.  Did you know that they are building a Native American Museum next to the Air & Space  Museum? 
Well, they had this PowWow in honor of it and will be having a PowWow every year.

There were Indians from all over the country.  The dancing and  singing was extraordinary.  It was beautiful to watch.  Everyone will be able to see another PowWow next Spring.

Well, each of the tribes has had at least 1 meeting.  Everyone has gotten a chance to know one another.  We have 3 tribes; the Piscataway (the boys tribe), the Chitimacha (a girls tribe), and the Naraghansett (another girls tribe).  We have a total of 19 Indians; 7 guides and 12 princesses.

Our 1st nation  event was  the Corn Maze at the Horizon Organic Farm.  Although the day was overcast and a little wet from the previous day everyone had a lot of fun.  The corn maze was about as large as a football field.  It took most people about an hour and a half to figure out the maze.  The Hofstrands (from the Piscataway) were the 1st Indians to get out of the maze.

Upcoming Nation Event

This month’s nation activity is the annual Sleepover at the Y.  It will be held on the night of Friday, November 15th.  We will all meet at the Y on Moylan Drive between 
7 - 7:30 pm.  Pizza will arrive around 7:30.  We’ve got a few special things planned as well as games and movies.  We’ll be sleeping at the Y, so make sure you bring all you need.  For those older Indians, the floor of the Y can be a little hard.  I suggest you bring some padding, and/or cushion in addition to your sleeping bag.  We’ll wakeup to donuts and juice (coffee for the older Indians).  We’ll be out of the Y by 10am on Saturday.  This month’s nation event is for Indians only.   Please contact me for a head count either by email   c.snider@mindspring.com    or you can call me @ 301-805-4640 so I can get a head count.  We are asking a $8 contribution per parent/child.

Don’t forget to bring:Sleeping Bag
                    Pillow
                    Padding/Cushion
                    PJ’s
                    Toothbrush/Toothpaste

Here are a few good ones!

If April showers bring May flowers, what do May flowers bring?

Why do turkeys always go, "gobble, gobble"? 

THE SPIRIT OF THE CORN; AN IROQUOIS LEGEND

By Harriet Maxwell Converse

     THERE was a time, says the Iroquois grandmother, when it was not needful to plant the corn- seed nor to hoe the fields, for the corn sprang up of itself, and filled the broad meadows.  Its stalks grew strong and tall, and were covered with leaves like waving banners, and filled with ears of pearly grain wrapped in silken green husks. 

     In those days Onatah, the Spirit of the Corn, walked upon the earth.  The sun lovingly touched her dusky face with the blush of the morning, and her eyes grew soft as the gleam of the stars on dark streams.  Her night-black hair was spread before the breeze like a wind-driven cloud. 

     As she walked through the fields, the corn, the Indian maize, sprang up of itself from the earth and filled the air with its fringed tassels and whispering leaves.  With Onatah walked her two sisters, the Spirits of the Squash and the Bean.  As they passed by, squash-vines and bean-plants grew from the corn-hills. 

 One day Onatah wandered away alone in search of early dew.  Then the Evil One of the earth, Hahgwehdaetgah, followed swiftly after.  He grasped her by the hair and dragged her beneath the ground down to his gloomy cave.  Then, sending out his fire-breathing monsters, he blighted Onatah's grain.  And when her sisters, the Spirits of the Squash and the Bean, saw the flame- monsters raging through the fields, they flew far away in terror. 

     As for poor Onatah, she lay a trembling captive in the dark prison-cave of the Evil One.  She mourned the blight of her cornfields, and sorrowed over her runaway sisters. 

     "O warm, bright sun!" she cried, "if I may walk once more upon the earth, never again will I leave my corn!" 

     And the little birds of the air heard her cry, and winging their way upward they carried her vow and gave it to the sun as he wandered through the blue heavens. 

     The sun, who loved Onatah, sent out many searching beams of light.  They pierced through the damp earth, and entering the prison-cave, guided her back again to her fields. 

     And ever after that she watched her fields alone, for no more did her sisters, the Spirits of the Squash and Bean, watch with her.  If her fields thirsted, no longer could she seek the early dew.  If the flame-monsters burned her corn, she could not search the skies for cooling winds.  And when the great rains fell and injured her harvest, her voice grew so faint that the friendly sun could not hear it. 

     But ever Onatah tenderly watched her fields and the little birds of the air flocked to her service.  They followed her through the rows of corn, and made war on the tiny enemies that gnawed at the roots of the grain. 

     And at harvest-time the grateful Onatah scattered the first gathered corn over her broad lands, and the little birds, fluttering and singing, joyfully partook of the feast spread for them on the meadow-ground.