Mark Warren 2
By Andrea Hamilton
It was a quiet drive up to Doug’s cabin in Grantsburg, Wisconsin. Everyone was lost in their thoughts or sleeping. We arrived at the cabin around 12:30, unloaded and walked down to our “home” for the next 3 days. It was beautiful, endless tail trees, St. Croix river about 50 feet in front of me and a warm sunny day. Doug asked us to be kind of quiet because Group One was still on the island, and that they’d probably be in reflective moods. So we went exploring around the forest, read, played music or whatever. As I looked around, I saw what an interesting group we made: Jessie Christi, Bill Zastera, Angie Arne, Mama Sutphen, Casey Wright, Scott Vetter, Geoff Boeller, Al Wright, Kelsey Crawford, Will Scheidler, me-Andrea Hamilton and our fearless leaders, our new para, Jonathan Sain, Pauline Von Ruden, and of course, Doug Berg. Group One showed up and the teachers made us lunch. We all played for awhile, then Group One left and we had some more goof off time. Mark went and sat with Bill who was playing guitar, I think they bonded with their musical talents. Mark then grouped us all together and rattled off all our names like he was psychic or something. Mark has these wise old eyes, so I kind of believed it.
After lunch he had us get into a circle and we played Zuegal, which is a game with a big stick and you throw it around in a certain way and it has all these weird funny rules. We finally got the hang of the game so Mark sat us down and gave us a knife safety lesson. Then he started teaching about trees and plants and how we depend on them so much, even in the modern world. We had to go find a plant called plantain which has many purposes one of them being healing bee stings. Then we went walking in the woods and found more plants with healing purposes or that we could eat. Mark taught us how to make rope out of Basswood bark and it was so amazing to look in your hands to see a strong, sturdy rope that you made.
We got back to the camp and played for awhile before dinner. Casey and Al went swimming in the freezing water. It looked so nice that I eventually joined Casey but it was so freezing I didn’t go in past my calves. Mark suggested that Casey dunk me!! Thank God he didn’t. Kelsey, Marna, Bill and I were the chief music makers but I don’t know how musical we sounded. We were having fun goofing around though.
Mark talked to us about the naming ceremony which is very spiritual and intimate and what it was ail about. He asked us to write an animal that we feel connected to, what our friends would say about us, and what we think positively about ourselves. He emphasized these were the best things and that our names are our highest compliments. So we all wrote these things down for him after dinner, then went and played tag in the dark, or sat round the fire. When we settled in our bags we were ail outside. It was a very beautiful night. Casey and Al and I were talking and laughing so they yelled at us to shut up because we were keeping them awake.
We woke up to Doug’s voice and rolled our grumbling about how early it was. We ate and ran around for a bit, then Mark taught us a game which is just like hac, but with a milk carton and even funnier and weirder rules than the first game. The best part was when Kelsey had to get on her knees and bark her name like a dog. She was really wimpy about it.
Mark then sat us down and taught us how to make fire, using a wooden bow, a sharpened stick, a rock, a flat piece of wood and Basswood bark as tinder. We did a guys team and a girls team. It wasn’t about speed but who could actually do it. Making fire is not the easiest thing in the world. So after several attempts of taking tums rubbing the stick together, Mama and I got the ash hot enough to light the tinder on fire. This was a joyous moment for us girls because this was a team effort. The guys on the other hand had to be threatened with no lunch to get the fire going, but they eventually got it.
Later we walked up a big hill and to the clearing where our stalking lesson began. Mark had us do some positions in stow motion. Then we had to pretend that Mark was a deer and stalk him. Some of us failed at our first attempts but we caught onto it. We went off to find the spot for our blinds, which are little huts we sit in so we are camouflaged. We went back to camp for a bit to snack on, because we were late eating dinner. Us girls had an arm wrestling match. We figured Marna and Jessi were the strongest. We went back to our blinds and settled down. The whole purpose of this was to be able to watch animals, but few of us saw anything. it was Kind of frightening being alone in the forest in the darkness, but as Mark put it-“It’s more dangerous in the city than it is in the woods.”
Doug made us a huge, yummy dinner. Then Mark sat us down and our naming ceremony began. He handed us our papers and told us to go read them. Then we came back to the fire and shared our long names, then our short names. Then we had to memorize them because that’s what we were to call each other the rest of the trip. These are our short names:
Kelsey Crawford – Wind Song
Mark Warren – Shadow Fox
Doug Berg – Side Stepping Crow
Scott Vetter – Lost Cat
Mama Sutphen – Wild Heart Horse
Al Wright – Standing Bear
Casey Wright – Painted Hawk
Jonathan Sain – Rising Panther
Bill Zastera – Touches the Wind
Goeff Boeller – Flying Deer
Angie Arne – Dancing Frog
Andrea Hamilton – Two Moons River
Jessi Christi – Scratching Fox
Will Schiedler – Sun Lion
We also learned Native American sign language to communicate. We all learned our names and basic words. It’s easy to learn and it’s a beautiful way to talk.
The next morning we got to sleep in because Mark and Doug went to see his new cabin. Jonathan made us breakfast, then we packed and cleaned up to get ready to go. Mark and Doug came back and we started for the island where the sweat lodge is. This is where the sign language came in handy because Mark told us there was to be no talking the whole time we were on the island. We canoed over and waited a couple of hours for the rocks to heat up. We passed time by playing games, reading, sleeping, or just enjoying the serenity. When Mark took the logs off the rocks we knew it was time. We blew off the ash and he put them in the lodge. We stripped to our suits or underwear and got in. Within seconds we started sweating. The heat was smothering but at the same time also soothing. Mark honored us and said some words for us along with our names.
After we got out, we cleaned up the island, put out the fire, went back to the cabin, ate lunch, hung out, cleaned up, and then took off for home. This was an experience, being with Mark and learning and doing all I did. I had fun getting to know everybody a little better and starting little jokes with people. (Jessi-Jethi-ha ha!!) But being relatively new, you all made my experience wonderful and you are ail very special people. Thank you to all my new friends, Doug, and especially Mark for opening my and a lot of other’s eyes to the beautiful world of earth, air, wind and fire.