I went for a sweat this past weekend. I really get a lot out of them, this was my second. I might get tired of them later but for now I like em. Any way if you have never been to one I recommend finding some Native American friends and go, do it the old way, if all the people are white find another sweat.
The sweat this past weekend was in this small non-town in Mississippi, about twenty minutes south of Carthage, in Neshoba county, right at the end of the Choctaw reservation. There were five of us there for the sweat, it was small but still powerful. The guy who normally runs the sweat wasn’t there, he was ill so it was run by my friend Mac. The thing is it was one Native American and four white guys. I thought that was funny. I got to bless the fire, so I prayed with tobacco in hand sprinkled it on the fire then got down to light it, twenty minutes later after I had let Mac down to light it the fire started. When I found out that Mark and his nephew weren’t coming, the two who usually run the sweat, I volunteered to carry the rocks from the fire to the lodge. At first I was glad to give back, at second I was afraid I wasn’t going to be able to do the job. Imagine a fire with 40 volcanic rocks in it, I could feel the heat burning my stomach as I leaned over it with the pitchfork to get the rocks. After the first two rounds it wasn’t so bad. The fire died down and I got used to the quickest way to get the stones out of the fire. By the third round I still didn’t look professional but I got it done.
The downside of carrying the stones is that I have to leave the lodge between the rounds. If I spend the entire time in the lodge, the heat change even with the door open isn’t as drastic if you stay in the lodge. Going from 120 to 75 over and over again then standing over the hot fire is a little different. I was happy to serve though. Since I got to just soak up the sweat last time, I wanted to help.
The sweat runs in this way:
The fire is started a few hours before the sweat starts
We are covered with smoke from singed sage
We enter the lodge crawling
The door man brings in the first seven stone while everyone is quiet in respect for the grandfather stones.
The first round is prayer for oneself
The second round is for men to pray
The third round is for women to pray- They always joke that those are the hardest rounds because since women have to go through childbirth they can take a lot more heat than men.
The last round is the thank you round and all prayer in thanking God for the sweat and all his gifts, very often in this time I thank him a lot for water.
Anyway it is deeper than that but I would be surprised if anyone is still reading.
