Co-Cke’ said Two-Spirit gatherings often draw men who are hiding that dimension of themselves from their wives. At the Montana gathering several people did not come because of the presence of a reporter.
For three days, solemn rituals alternated with pop cultural references, high camp and playful but sharp intertribal teasing.
Matthew Reed, 32, who manages a Starbucks franchise in Denver, began the Saturday night powwow by leading an august gourd dance to cleanse the grounds. “Does everyone know how to gourd dance?” he asked, then advised: “Drop it like it’s hot,” a reference to a dance-filled rap video by Snoop Dogg.
As the night grew cold, Joey Criddle, who led a contingent called the “Denver divas,” explained for the group the historical significance of some of the dances and clothing.
Criddle, 45, a respiratory therapist and part Jicarilla Apache, was once married and has four children. He said that in Denver his group was trying to gain credibility and acceptance from tribal leaders by preserving the old language, skills and dances. “The elders will tell you the difference between a gay Indian and a Two-Spirit,” he said, underscoring the idea that simply being gay and Indian does not make someone a Two-Spirit.
Involvement with Two-Spirits has changed Bane’s life. After the Tulsa gathering he moved to Denver to live near Criddle’s group, and he stopped dating a man who refused to acknowledge their relationship in public. “I used to think that was OK,” he said. “Now I don’t.” He was also embracing some traditionally female tasks and slowly learning to do beadwork. “Beadwork gives you patience for traffic,” he said.
The surprise for his non-Indian friends, Bane said, was how much fun the gatherings were. “You read about it and think it’s real serious, and it is,” he said. “But then you have the drag show on the first night. When I told my friends, ‘I gotta get my drag outfit together,’ my white friends, they’re like, ‘What?”’
Jaxin Enemy-Hunter, 28, said he found it rewarding to see people who were not raised in the Two-Spirit tradition embrace it, but their journey was not his. Growing up on a Crow reservation, he had been singled out early by his great-grandmother and given a double helping of education: studying with the boys and then studying with the girls when the boys played. He described the experience as both high status and extremely stressful.
“A lot of Two-Spirit societies, their focus is to bring the Two-Spirit role to their tribes,” he said. “With my tribe, we had never lost that. The younger generations focus more on the mainstream way of being a gay person, going out and partying, and not having responsibilities and being stressed out.”
Off the reservation, he added, “I would see friends going through hell over being gay. It was just very sad. They didn’t know about our history.”
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