Discoveries
Can’t Eclipse Optimism
Yesterday was the big eclipse. I’ve been reading with great interest the various stories and responses to this event from tribal communities. I always remind folks just how diverse tribes are in their languages, cultures, lifeways, histories and in personality traits that grow from both nurture and nature. The eclipse,…
High on the Hill
Earlier this month, Judge Sara Hill started her new job. She is a new federal district court judge. United States District Court for the Northern District of Oklahoma. I’m on the way to the American Bar Association’s Midyear meeting where, amoung other events, I’ll attend the ABA’s Spirit of Excellence…
Happy Campers
Growing up, we weren’t the kind of people that went to summer camps. I learned about those “city-kids-off-in-the-woods-near-some-lake-for-three-weeks-and-get-your-first-kiss” kind of camps from 1980s coming of age movies. And, despite being a christian family in the bible belt, my dad was not keen on us going to most of the Vacation…
Sigh
I’m typing this with my lesser hand because yesterday, I got my dominant shoulder scoped and the block hasn’t fully worn off. Ouchy. When they got in there to clean out a little calcium, a more detailed rotator cuff repair followed. The ghosts of many basketball games and tennis matches…
Asterisk This
The luxury of sipping morning coffee in a quiet house. With a roaring fire cracking in the fireplace, I look out the window at the frosty ground and the pink-ish color that remains on the river after the sunrise. It’s hard to find any fault with the world from this…
Joy and Chafing
13.1 miles. A half marathon. Walk it. Run it. A mix of both. Either way you slice it, it will probably leave a modest mark of some kind on your skin. Somewhere. You might not know it until you get in the shower, but it’s there. Today’s marks were two-fold…
Sex and Money
Now that I have your attention, let’s talk about just one of those topics. The money. But wait. Isn’t this a blog about Indigenous health and wellness? Yep. Indigenous food and medicine. Healing ourselves. Taking control of that which we uniquely control. For ourselves. The ups and downs of trying…
Left Speechless By Art That Speaks Volumes
I am a Cherokee woman of a certain age and a lawyer. There are precious few things in this world that truly render me speechless. This stopped me in my tracks. It is triggering. Breathtaking. Raw. And absolutely spot on. This digital illustration entitled “Matoaka” by Nathalie Standingcloud (Cherokee, Creek,…
Auntie Ballers and How Natives “Discovered” Basketball
Basketball holds a special place in Indian country. In fact, Natives “discovered” basketball and now claim it as their own. True. It’s ours. If you are skeptical of this “discovery” assertion, you should have been in Norman, Oklahoma this weekend for the Annual “Oklahoma’s Best” All Indian State Tournament. Or…
A Plant-Based Timeline + 102/70
Here’s a visual of what a Sunday trip to Reasor’s (the local grocery store in Tahlequah) now yields for my counter top space. The other veggies, apples, berries, vegetable juice, citrus, and almond milk are refrigerated. The processed food in the basket this? Plain Cheerios. The bananas are not mine.…
Modern RV Indians on a Big Indian Law Day
One year ago this week, the COVID shutdown changed our daily routines and like most of you, we have spent the year mostly at home. We have dealt with loss and grief, but we’ve also used the year to get healthier. Priorities overhauled. More time with family. Cooking and eating…
New Tahlequah Food
I’m no restaurant critic, but I am a fan of these two things: (1) supporting small businesses in small towns and (2) healthy food options in the heart of the Cherokee Nation. Tonight we grabbed dinner at Rafa’s Burrito Co. in downtown Tahlequah, Cherokee Nation. It’s only their second day…
Picking Up Broken Glass + Broken Hearts
This week, I audibly sighed. At so many things. Near the top of that list? A few of the questions posed to the Hon. Deb Haaland, a Laguna Pueblo woman nominated to serve as the next Secretary of Interior. Not just the Indian Affairs part of Interior, the whole Department…
Worth The Money: Two
“Worth the Money: One,” focused on getting a single really good knife and then storing that knife in a handy visible place. When cutting things is pleasurable and simple, you’ll do it more and eat better. Today, the focus is on the importance of getting a GREAT blender – the…
Cereal, Seeds and Puberty
We are midway through another “normal” school week of family life, online classes, and writing, topped off with a healthy (or unhealthy) dose of tribal politics, depending on your tolerance level. Today was one of those days where we just had cereal for dinner. It was all we could do.…
100 Years Old
Today, my Grandpa Leeds would have been 100. Both of my grandfathers were outstanding. Good husbands, big sacrificers, they teased big, and they loved all the babies. This grandpa was a farmer and rancher. Cows, corn, soybeans, watermelon, cantaloupes, pecans – you name it, he produced it. He did so…
Let’s Get Personal: Heart Health + Indigenous Women
Today is National Wear Red Day – to raise awareness about heart disease in the United States. But let’s get up close and personal: “Heart disease, the leading cause of death for all American women, takes a disproportionately heavy toll on Native American women. American Indian and Alaska Native women…
Hard Lessons to Learn + Red Rice
Today started off downright splendid. A gorgeous Oklahoma sunrise followed by one of the most productive mornings of writing (on tribal taxation) imaginable. Cranking away at a pace that would make most Indian Law nerds blush, I was also multi-tasking by thinking ahead to dinner. In the late morning,…
Elimination Diets + My Stupid Friday Night
I’ve been thinking a lot about elimination diets lately, in part because a family member is currently giving that a try. Elimination diets aren’t about losing weight or going on a “diet.” It’s the process of totally not consuming a distinct type of food that might be making you…
Beans, Rice + Blue Zones
A few years ago, we had the good fortune to travel to Costa Rica on a family trip and that’s when I first began to learn about Blue Zones – a few places around the globe where people live a really long time. In Costa Rica, the Nicoya Peninsula…
Juicing
One of the stranger “discoveries” in my last year has been juicing. That’s right, the process of extracting juice from fruits, vegetables and tubers and then eating that exclusivley for a few days. My friend Corey turned me on to this and she can elaborate on her amazing story later,…
Worth the Money: One
When I get push back or skeptisism about going mostly plant-based it’s predictably two things: (1) “How will you ever get enough protein?” (2) “Must be nice, but that’s too expensive for us.” Those two responses are as predictable as a total stranger telling you about their Cherokee princess great…
On the Road Again
I love Will Nelson. His songs speak to so many of my truths. As we start the 9th month of COVID response, I really miss travel “and I can’t wait to get on the road again.” I am a traveler. International. Domestic. Backroads. All of it. Arkansas’s legendary Senator Fulbright…
Sooooo Good Lookin’
Mainstream educators seem to be taught 3 things about Native students and then they think they are done. All good. (1) They don’t make eye contact, (2) They are quiet, (3) They are visual learners. I’m not going to get into the first 2 over-generalizations right now, only the…
Know When to Hold ‘Em and Fold ‘Em
You might notice that my food posts are on various different plates. These dishes belonged to my great-granny, my grandmas (both sides) and my auntie. It’s off-personality that I kept them. I’m a notorious anti-hoarder. I come from a family of folks who like to keep things around “just in…
What Foods Are Indigenous? And, Mansplaining
My husband is an old ᎤᏁᎬ (white) guy who grew up in the Arkansas delta. You’d think graduating from a school called Osceola High, he’d know a little more about Natives. Like many Americans, when it comes to Indigenous history and contributions, he starts stupid arguments with Indigenous people (actually…
Indigenous Food + Native-Owned Bookstores
In the one of the January health stories, Devon Mihesuah (Choctaw) was featured. She won the 2020 Gourmand World Cookbook Award Winner of the Gourmand International World Cookbook Award, for the newest edition of Recovering Our Ancestors’ Gardens and that link is to BirchBark Books. Devon’s book includes new recipes…
Things We “Discovered”
Most of the contributors to this website, are the great grandkids (several times over) of people and Nations that were “discovered” to be very much alive and well in this hemisphere in 1492 and before. Those Indigenous people, like these contributors, were agriculturist, philosophers, advocates, healers, scholars, artists, and everyday…
Featured Post
Famous Last Words, Dean 2.0
Last week, most of you heard that I’ll be starting a new gig soon. In the latest episode of “the 20 year old Stacy never saw this coming,” I’ll pick up as dean of the Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at Arizona State University effective February 1, 2023. This will be my second rodeo: […]
Can’t Eclipse Optimism
Yesterday was the big eclipse. I’ve been reading with great interest the various stories and responses to this event from tribal communities. I always remind folks just how diverse tribes are in their languages, cultures, lifeways, histories and in personality traits that grow from both nurture and nature. The eclipse, and conversations around it, serve […]
Auntie Ballers and How Natives “Discovered” Basketball
Basketball holds a special place in Indian country. In fact, Natives “discovered” basketball and now claim it as their own. True. It’s ours. If you are skeptical of this “discovery” assertion, you should have been in Norman, Oklahoma this weekend for the Annual “Oklahoma’s Best” All Indian State Tournament. Or check out any state championship […]
Lori Enlow: The Gift of Life
L Despite my best efforts and self-awareness, my mind will still sometimes take a word and then pop-up a stereotype. A quick image in my mind of what X should look like. When you hear the words “ultra-marathoner” and “endurance athlete,” what do YOU think of? My friend Lori Enlow has forever changed those words […]
Picking Up Broken Glass + Broken Hearts
This week, I audibly sighed. At so many things. Near the top of that list? A few of the questions posed to the Hon. Deb Haaland, a Laguna Pueblo woman nominated to serve as the next Secretary of Interior. Not just the Indian Affairs part of Interior, the whole Department of Interior. I processed some […]
Stacy Leeds: Being (un) Healthy
I’m a professor, former law dean, judge, mom. The last 25 years, I’ve been going hard and fast. Most of the time, my energy is spent on the good stuff I wouldn’t take back, but I have a tendency to revert back to a lifestyle that could kill me if I didn’t get it together. I’m still very much in the process of getting “it” together. But I’m on to something.
Gluten/Wheat and the KFC “Last Supper”
Yeah, I can’t eat gluten or wheat either. I figured this out in 2010 when heading home from a trip to DC. A lady on the airplane saw me touching my eyeball socket, grimacing. She asked if I was getting a migraine. Yep. I got them all the damn time, starting at age 25 and […]