Neither_Wolf_Nor_Dog by Kent Nerburn

Author:Kent Nerburn [Nerburn, Kent]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: New World Library
Published: 2008-09-28T22:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER

FIFTEEN

SHINY

SOUP

Soon signs of human habitation began to appear. A small dot in the distance proved to be a mailbox on a post, set next to a rutted dirt roadway that curved off over the hills. About a mile further down two white men in cowboy hats were herding several dozen cattle along the side of the road. The man in the lead was driving a tractor, while the man in the rear rode a large brown horse. They waved and smiled as Grover slowed to pass them.

“Good town for you up here,” Grover said.

“How do you mean?” I asked.

“White town. Homestead town. You'll feel at home. We'll stop for something to eat. You can make your phone call.”

I puzzled at his characterization of the town, but as it appeared in the distance, I understood. This was not a “reservation” town of trailers, random pockets of gone-to-seed tract housing, junk cars in yards, and the occasional commercial enterprise sitting back from a dusty, rutted, dirt parking area. Instead, it loomed in the distance like any of a thousand rural enclaves that dot the plains and prairies of the central U.S. — a tiny huddling of buildings standing proud against the horizontal landscape, capped by those two proud monuments to civic and spiritual accomplishment — the water tower and the church steeple.

Though it was in the middle of a reservation, this was a white town; a product of the Dawes Act of 1887 that had chopped up reservations into 160-acre parcels and allotted them to individual Indians in an attempt to convert them to the ways of farming and private ownership. Few Indians had ever taken to farming, and even fewer had understood the subtleties of private land ownership. Before long, through legal maneuvers, swindles, and sales agreements of varying legitimacy, white settlers had obtained the best land on almost all the reservations in the country. In addition, land that had been left over after all eligible Indians had received the 160 acres had then been opened up for white homesteaders. Though the land technically remained within the boundaries of the reservations, it was settled and developed like white towns all over the prairies and plains. A traveler who was paying no attention to maps or road signs might drive into one of these towns and never know he or she was on a reservation, except for the unusual number of Indians conducting their business there.

Even from a mile away I marveled at how completely different this little town seemed from the world in which I had spent the last week. There was an implied sense of order here. The road was tarred. The approach of the town was heralded by the gradual and orderly increase in human habitation. The commercial and the residential areas were distinct and demarcated. The signage, though intrusive, was professional and of a piece. In concept and in layout, there was an underlying mathematics to the experience.

Grover switched on his turn signal as we passed the black and white highway sign that announced, “Business District.

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