The Home of the Brave
Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians
Tonight began the Mississippi International Film Festival. After the opening gala which I didn’t attend, the Choctaw Tribute started. I’d anticipated seeing this for the past couple days. The Choctaws performed traditional dances and songs prior to the film “The Choctaw Journey.”
The tribe turned a stageplay about The Trail of Tears they performed at their annual Choctaw Indian Fair into a film. To know the devastation of the tribe’s history is uncomfortable, so there was something immensely unsettling to me this evening. To hear the current Miss Choctaw Princess Mahlih Rene Vaughn sing “The National Anthem” in Choctaw was the height of irony. Some might have found it beautiful. I found it heartbreaking. I suppose I should have seen resilience. Dedication. Commitment. Perseverance. Longsuffering. Redemption. Honor. Instead, I saw a Choctaw girl dressed in traditional garb singing, “O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave” in her native tongue.
Oh what tangled webs have been weaved for us.
