Am I not Native enough?

When are people gonna stop correcting me on my self-proclaimed racial status? I am half Norwegian, half American Indian, Leech Lake Ojibwe to be specific. I maybe light-skinned, which has always been somewhat of an annoyance to me, (so thank Goddess for the miracle of tanning booths!) but I’m not white.

Ever since I was a kid friends and high school peers have been telling me I wasn’t Indian. Not just that group of rez-boys when I was little, but white and black people as well! The white kids of suburban Rochester always subtly:

“Oh, you ARE? Wow, you, like, really can’t tell.” 

Inner-city black kids have been a bit more straightforeward:

“Shit, Nina. You ‘bout as white as they come, yo.”

It’s not like I don’t know I’m not nut-brown with long sleek black hair and that I don’t have a pet raccoon as a sidekick, but I’m not blond, blue-eyed, battle-ax toting Viking either. I’ve spent good chunks of my life both on my families reservation as well as the Norwegian countryside. I check the “Other” box when questioned about my ethnicity, I read AIM autobiographies, embrace and question my white privilege, have danced in powwows, etc. I am bi-racial, thank you. I just tend to find the native half of my culture a tad more interesting.

My fellow halfbreed in crime, my best friend Reina and I got tattoos. Reina got an Incan man in celebration of her Colombian side of the family, and I got a Thunder Bird, which would be my Indian name, not the car.  So after a session of searing pain...

We ended up with awesome new wounds that look a little something like this:

A few weeks later, my boyfriend, family and I were at this little touristy “AUTHENTIC NATIVE AMERICAN TOTEM POLE” shop at Niagara Falls. The owner of this place was a man who both looked and sounded very asian, as he came up to me and said very mysteriously:

“Ah, what a beautiful new tattoo. What does it symbolize?”

Me: “Oh, thank you. Well, it’s a Thunder Bird that my friend designed. My tr---“

Him: “No.”

Me: “...”

Him: “The Native American thunder bird can be recognized by the feathers on top of its head, like an owl, such as the one you can see over there on that wooden sculpture I have made. So, your friend has made a huge mistake. That tattoo is a RAVEN!”

Me (pretty surprised and a little insulted considering I have just branded this “Raven” forever onto my skin): “Uh, no. It’s an Ojibwe THUNDER BIRD! Based on these old cave designs and Ojibwe beadwork!”

Then I am given a lecture about how he knows better, his grandmother was an Indian from British Columbia, and even though my tattoo is a very nice raven, it’s still not a thunderbird because it lacks feathers on it’s head. 

Needless to say, we left without purchasing anything.

Later, when retelling this story to my father, he pointed out the fact that the guy was a little sad. He probably did have an Indian grandma from British Columbia who he heard all about as a kid and then spent a lot of his adult life trying to learn about native culture. 

So, I suppose I can’t be too hard on the guy, because in the end we’re all just trying to be Indian enough, aren’t we?