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March Madness: CBS Wins No Matter What

Reads I have bruised some rather fragile masculine egos.


Okpulot Taha
Choctaw Nation

March Madness: CBS Wins No Matter What

Julia Boorstin, a young, beautiful and most important, a successful woman, dances on an age old glass ceiling then pauses to comment,

"If you're an NCAA basketball fan, you're probably watching games wherever you are...."


Your comment delights me in a way most would never guess. Your words remind me of significant generation gap and reminds me of an exceptionally significant cultural gap.

I am always delighted to witness one of our gender rise to such success through good education and through hard work although there is a bit of envy on my part knowing you were born to circumstances of wealth allowing you to attend Princeton.

My most meaningful education was taught working alongside my Choctaw elders out in our crop fields on our rural Oklahoma farm, long before you were born. I was also taught how to be right tough plowing behind a mule whose belly bottom was about head high to me, during my early childhood. Out in our fields, I learned of life through American Indian eyes and learned a half-ton mule can drag you across five acres of land, without breaking a sweat.

I am somewhat delighted, more amused really, observing fat, dumb and happy men sleeping and snoring in front a television airing a football game on Thanksgiving Day, a result of those men stuffing their faces with far too much food and wine. I reckon the future is truly here with snoring men now sitting, sound asleep, in front of a computer monitor with sound system blaring a football game. This works better; I can vacuum my living room floor without a need to move men’s feet and legs around. Seems your audience is not always paying attention.

We grew up listening to Grandpa’s tiny AM radio, powered by a six volt car battery. Each Sunday, we were to listen to a fire and brimstone preacher out of Del Rio, Texas. There were some special times he would allow us to listen to radio shows, like Green Hornet, Groucho Marx, Gunsmoke along with Superman and Sherlock Holmes. The Del Rio preacher, though, this man I cannot shake from my radio days memories; his fiery voice still preaches within my pagan mind.

Electricity came into our farm during the late Sixties, also my late childhood being born in Sixty even. A year later, Grandpa came back from town carting a television in the back of his mule drawn wagon; took our family a year to save up enough money to buy a television set. We never had enough money to own a car, never wanted a car anyhow. This was the day my world changed, the day my world became much larger.

Frankenstein, Dracula, Wolfman caused me to hold tight to Grandma. Three Stooges, Abbott and Costello, Amos and Andy, gave all of us a good laugh. Although black and white on our old television, Star Trek taught me there are worlds beyond our hot humid Oklahoma skies. Grandpa did not much care for Star Trek but he loved wrestling matches on television, even gave our television set a thump on top and adjusted those rabbit ears to be sure he did not miss a second of wrestlers “cheating” at fighting.

My Choctaw elders did not care for television at all. I spent most of my evenings, after a hard day’s work out in the fields, simply sitting on our front porch listening to wonderful tall tales told to us in my native American Indian tongue. Within our culture, within my native culture, we are story tellers beyond compare. Story telling is a critical component of our culture. This is how we teach our young, how we maintain our culture and our traditions. This is how we learn of life. I do envy your Princeton education; I had to settle for a English doctorate out of the University of California, paid for through my odd part-time jobs and my husband’s support. Despite my envy of your Princeton education, I am quite sure you would envy my Choctaw education delivered under a hot Oklahoma sun, delivered with sweat, dirt and plenty of ticks and chiggers sucking our very blood, just as you would envy my learning how to free myself from a step-in plow while be dragged along by a mule moving at a stubborn good trot.

I never watch sports games on television nor does our girl nor does her father. There is no interest for us. Sports lack any story telling, lack imparting moral conflicts to resolve, lack mystery and intrigue. More succinct, sports are boring, even during our time of suffering modern technology such as suffering having to buy a new television in early 2009 year simply so I can catch reruns of Get Smart and old scary movies on KDOC out of Orange County. Well, I could not survive life without my nightly dose of PBS, especially Nova and Jim Lehrer.

Nothing wrong with sports. I know the many love watching sports. This is a generation gap and a cultural gap. We grew up telling stories, tall tales and, of course, a lot of swapping lies. We grew up reading books loaned to us by our only schoolmarm, Mamie J, who taught four generations of our family in a two room school house over in Eagletown, Oklahoma.

I am not a Thoroughly Modern Millie but modern enough to recognize you, Julia Boorstin, have accomplished much in your life at a fairly young age. You are dancing upon an ageless glass ceiling while many men look up to you, hopefully with proper respect and in the right places.

Personally, I am not all this thrilled by modern technology although I am sitting here typing on a fancy computer and connected to our world through the web. I am, however, always thrilled to know of another woman who has beat the odds and has beat men by becoming very successful in work, and in life. You are to be commended for your hard work and for your breaking your way through that glass ceiling we know too well, even though I do not watch your sports shows.

To close, a bit of advice from a now Choctaw elder. Stories are best told while sitting out on a front porch with friends, and while sipping white lightning from a shared Mason jar.

Okpulot Taha
Choctaw Nation