Please help Otis Parrish write his life history.

The Sacred Eagle Project: An Introduction

My name is Otis Parrish. I am an elder of the Kashaya Pomo tribe in western Sonoma County, California, and I come from a long line of spiritual leaders of my people from a very distant past. I am a father and a grandfather, a retired archaeologist and anthropologist, and I am a Cultural Historian. I am a ceremonial singer, performer and speaker.

I am a linguist and a specialist in my language, Kashaya, which I speak and read fluently. I have a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Anthropology from Sonoma State University, along with a Master’s Graduate Degree in Anthropology and Archaeology from UC Berkeley. I am a published author and I worked as a counselor for Native American veterans of the Korean and Vietnam wars. I was the Assistant Director at the Phoebe Hearst Museum for five years until I retired in 2004.

Along with my daughter, I am a tribal genealogist, keeping the records of our past for our people to carry into the future.

I am an artist with many hands: I am a silversmith and a goldsmith, a painter and illustrator, a woodworker and I play the guitar.

My mother, the late Essie Parrish, is one of the last and most important spiritual leaders of Kashaya and she and my father, Sidney Parrish, were both very instrumental in leading our tribe through the difficult period of the 1950s, 60s and 70s.

The book that I am writing is a chronicle of my life and that of my mother and father. But even more, it is a gathering together of the richness that is my life and that of my family and culture, along with all the things I’ve learned and experienced along the way about our story. It is a gathering of my gratitude and a giving of something back, in book form, to my tribe, to my children and grandchildren, to their children and grandchildren... and to all of you to carry into the future. It is one that reaches back as far as I can with what I know of my mother and father’s and my ancestor’s history. It is one that sees from the perspective of my upbringing as the son of a very powerful shaman and her devoted husband, and the rich cultural life that was my childhood and young adult life on the reservation... and it is one that sees also through eyes of my professional career as an anthropologist and archaeologist... and finally, it is one that sees through the eyes now of an elder of my tribe.

This is a book that has been stirring within me and forming for the better part of my life, and it longs to add more color and texture, depth and detail to the painting that is our unique and beautiful culture... one that adds more meaning. Truthfully, I reach for something that is far beyond me and I know this is no small task.

As I reach these later years of my life I have come to this one inescapable conclusion: I need to act now for the benefit of my people. I can see that the cultural landscapes for my people are changing so fast and at this late stage of my life I find myself longing to leave something more of myself, some signposts of my own to mark these fast disappearing trails. I want to act so that others, both within my tribe and even those outside it in the wider world, too, might see through my eyes and the broad experience of these things I have lived and I carry now as an elder, a tribal person... as a living link yet to the rich past of our people.

I see more than ever that the echoes from our ancestral past must somehow be kept alive and that it is my time to recall as much as I am still able to recall. And it is here, now, so late in the day, that these memories come flooding back to me.

Within the vision of the writing of this book, I believe that I am carrying out the wishes and the grand design of my mother and my father, who continue to guide me today from another realm. They are the ones who taught me the most about the beauty of my culture, the sacredness of our world and the magic at my feet... and, I believe they still do.

In commencing this project I have decided to honor the Divine power of the Golden Eagle... Kilak, in our language, the Sacred Eagle, and in this way, I honor my dear mother and my father. I am calling this project, The Sacred Eagle Project, and for now, pending any further changes, my book will be titled, Coming Home.

To a Kashaya person, everything that ever happened in the Kashaya world was under the watchful guidance of Kilak, the high flyer, and I suggest to you it is to this day.

My book is coming along well now and in a really good way. As chapters are forming and fitting together now, It is taking great shape and feeling like the vision I’ve long carried of it being something very special is now more than ever coming into focus.

I have dreamed for quite some time of having an office, a place where I can really work, and it’s now at this stage of my writing that I’m in need of a dedicated space that is not a bedroom, to see me through to the publication of my work. The situation I am in now won’t allow for that. I’m fortunate to have a daughter and son-in-law who have given me a room in their home to live for these past few years, and I’m extremely grateful to them for taking me in the way that they have, but my room is sized for a small boy. Though I have managed for a very long time to get my work to this stage, there is really no room for me to work at all. There’s no room for a proper desk and chair, a place to set up a computer and large monitor, let alone a printer or scanner or space for files. I have no bookshelves, no tables with room to do the graphics work of going through and laying out the large collection of rare photos that I have and want to publish.

Though my needs really are far greater than I describe here, my immediate goal is to raise enough money for me to rent an office for a year, which I believe will give my work an enormous boost at this important juncture. A perfect and beautiful, small office is being held for me at this time and the rent is $575 a month. I’m hoping for a year’s rent, roughly $7,000, and I believe I can achieve my goal of publication of my book, Coming Home.

If you’d like to support my work in this way, please know that your donation is golden to me, not only will it go far in helping me to achieve my goals, but you give us energy and love, and we look forward to giving something back to you.

Yahwih,

“Thank you,” in my language.

Sincerely, with respect and love,

Otis Parrish