Touring Home – summary

Susan Power is a member of the Sioux tribe, and is very proud of it. Still, she did not grow up on the Plains, but in the city of Chicago. Throughout her upbringing, her mother passed on the stories and traditions of her Native American background. Below, Susan tells a story from her childhood.

When Susan was little, she used to play with her mother’s long dark braid, pretending it was a snake. Her mother used to have long hair, but she cut it short when she grew older.

Her mother tells her stories all the time, and Susan likes to share her stories with other people. Susan lets us know how her mother left the Indian reservation when she was only 16 years old. When she left the Plains, she had never been on a train or used a telephone before. She moved to the city during the war to earn money for her family.

Susan believes that her mother is a strong and independent woman, not afraid of anything. She is very politically active. She likes to talk about politics and attend sit-ins. Susan feels she is the opposite of her mother.

Every weekend they go to the Historical Society. Here they visit historical museums and art galleries. Every time they are here, they visit her great- grandmother’s buckskin dress, the Plain Indians’ traditional outfit. Her mother thinks it is sad that the dress belongs to the museum and not to the family. By the exit stands a stuffed little buffalo. Sometimes her mother stops up and says hello to it. The buffalo makes her mother sad. She has great respect for the animal whose buckskin helped them survive on the plains. She tells the little animal that it does not belong here. She says that it should have been in the Dakotas. She says that neither of them feel at home in the big city. Susan on the other hand is a city child. She grew up in the city and calls it her home.