Smoke Signals December 1993
Page 6
HEALTH AND WELLNESS
Research Finds Drunk Boating "AH Wet"
The late Cleveland Indian pitcher Tim Crews put a face on the problem of drinking and boating last March. With
a blood alcohol level equivalent to six or seven beers, Crews rammed his boat into a dock, killing himself, one teammate,
and seriously injuring another.
Three weeks after the accident, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) urged statestoconsider licensing
recreational boaters. Currently, only New Jersey requires such licenses.
According to NTSB's Boating Safety Study (1986-91), nearly 1,000 persons are killed annually in boating
accidents, at least 50 percent which involve alcohol. The Centers For Disease Control reports that more than 46,000 persons
are injured each year in boating accidents seriously enough to visit an emergency room.
New findings by two Boston researchers flesh out the often ignored problem of what they call "drunk boating".
About half the boaters surveyed are unaware that federal law prohibits the operation of a boat on navigable waterways when
the operator has a blood alcohol content greater than . 10, and that 40 states have similar laws.
While boaters frown on drinking a driving a vehicle, they express little concern over drinking while operating or riding
in a boat.
Ironically, boaters surveyed are supportive of having laws restricting drinking and boating. More than half of those who
drink while boating say that alcohol does not add to the enjoyment of boating.
The National Transportation and Safety Board estimated the number of recreational boats in the United States has
doubled in two decades, totaling 20 million.
According to the research findings, drinking happens most often around power-boating and fishing from a boat.
(About one-third of the respondents report drinking right before or during these activities.)
Alcohol creates a sensation of warmth that may lead intoxicated swimmers to remain in the water longer than if they were
sober.
Alcohol dilates blood vessels, increasing exposure of blood supply to cold temperature and increasing risk of hypothermia.
Alcohol intoxication may increase risk for caloric labrynthitis, an inner-ear disturbance that may cause someone suddenly
immersed with cold water to become disoriented and swim down rather than up.
Alcohol may work synergistically with environmental stressors (wind, glare, vibration, noise, and wave motion) to degrade
performance of boaters, according to field tests sponsored by the U.S. Coast Guard.
Among the boaters surveyed, 82 percent report that family members drink on or near the water, and 87 percent
report that their friends drink on or near the water. Boaters whose friends and family members drink are much more likely
to report drinking while boating themselves.
New Face: Theron Ruiz
The Tribe has
recently hired a new Human
Services Treatment
Coordinator, Theron Ruiz.
He is a member of the
Morongo Tribe of Southern
California, but has lived and
worked in Oregon for
seventeen years, including
being employed as Clinical
Director of Ranch Care, a
residential treatment center
in Eugene.
He is a nationally
certified alcohol and drug
counselor, and has served on
the Oregon Certification
Board. During his spare time,
he has been in private
practice.
"I felt that I wanted to be in private practice full
time, but this opportunity in Grand Ronde came about, and
I decided it was a challenge I wanted to be a part of," he said.
Theron works closely with counselors and intake
specialists to determine the needs of the clients in the Alcohol
and Drug and Social Services programs. He is a very
traditional person, and believes in the value of all people.
Said Theron, "Over the years our beliefs as Indians have
changed. The Circle of Life has been broken. Drugs and
alcohol have as much to do with that as the termination of
tribes and putting Indian people on reservations."
Theron Ruiz
He continued,
"There are many
misconceptions in white
society. Like we're all on
welfare, we're notvery smart,
or we're drunks. In the past,
our pride and personal
strengths have been taken
away."
As a single parent,
Theron doesn't want his
children to lose their
heritage, and he teaches them
about tradition. He says that
many Indian people have lost
their cultural identity. He
also has strongfeelings about
the unwritten rules in society
that label people and forces
them into strict categories of
"bad" or "good" depending on the style of life a person leads.
And he wants the clients of the Tribe's Human
Services Division to know that they aren't bad people, and
that the circumstances of a person's life doesn't make that
person bad.
"There are people who don't know how to be parents
because they were never raised with a positive parental
figure. Therearepeoplewhomaybesufferingfromaddiction,
out of work, or homeless and need some assistance. That
doesn't mean we should look at these people in a negative
way."
"Aren't Supposed To"
The following is a short story written by a client
from the Apache tribe who was a client atNanitch Sahallie
Youth Treatment Center in Keizer, Oregon. Stories written
by clients will have Native American themes and will be a
regular feature in the Smoke Signals.
When I put my tape into the tapedeck, I didn't
realize that it wasnt theonel wanted to listen to, butl listened
to it anyway. The evening was slightly cool and just a little
warm. I guess that it just got that way in certain areas.
As I pulled up to the Holy Grounds I could see that
there weren't too many people there, for some reason it didn't
surprise me. It's been years since they've held one of these
dances. I could already hear all of the snakes making all of
their noises. It kind of gave me chills to think off all those
snakes in the baskets crawling all over each other, maybe
even biting each other. That's crazy.
As the medicine men started to beat on the drums
the snake's rattles slowly started to fade away, then were at
a stop. The voices of the men seemed to be louder than the
drurnming. I could hear people walking out of the mesquite
trees. By now it was pretty dark, so I really couldn't see too
much. The dancers came out in a single file line. Each of
them painted with such beautiful colors of red, white, yellow,
and black. There was only four of them. I thought that there
would be a whole lot more of them, but I guess not.
The people lined up also, kind of in front of the
singers. The dancers grabbed the baskets and set them in
front of themselves, each with one. They started to dance and
pray over the baskets. I felt like running to my truck and
grabbing my camera but my grandfather told me not to take
any pictures of what I was going to see tonight. I stood there
and watched as my grandfather walked up to the line. After
about four songs the dancers opened up the baskets and
reached in them. I was waiting for one of them to pull his
hand our with quickness when he got bit, nothing happened.
The snakes were sort of in a trance with the dancers.
It was really kind of weird to watch but at the same time very
fascinating. The dancers then came up to the people with the
snakes in their hands praying and dancing with the beats of
the drums and the strong voices of men. This was really cool.
As the dancers came up to my grandfather and
started to pray for him I thought I had seen one of those snakes
strike at the top of his head, but wasn't too sure. He just kept
his head down and didn't say anything if it did. I was just
standing there, tripping out, waiting to see if he would pass
out or something. He didn't.
After the ceremony was over, I walked over to my
grandfather and asked him if the rattlesnake had really bit
him. He looked at me for a minute. Then he said, "Did it
really strike at my head?" He seemed shocked that I had
asked him that. I told him that it looked like it did. He put
his hand on the top of his head, there was a little bit of blood
on his hand. We both looked at each other with a question
mark on our faces. He said that snakes aren't supposed to do
that.
We walked over to one of the medicine men, my
grandfather told the man what happened. He said the same
thing that my grandfather had said, "They aren't supposed to
do that." He told him not to worry about poison, that was all
he said. We walked over to the baskets of snakes. The man
opened up the basket that had the snake that bit him. We all
looked inside and one of the snakes was dead.