Native women and Native men have, like the vast majority of America, serious, serious problems living with each other (as evidenced by the fact that divorce rates in America are now down to 45%). As I get older and examine my own life, and also am graciously invited to share in other lives, I’m beginning to realize that the problems between Native women and men begin in adolescence or childhood. Heck, infancy.

Really, really, young.

See, a LOT of those Native female/male problems comes down to this: Native boys and men expect wayyyy too much from Native mothers. We never truly grow up in that regard—we get used to mom always cleaning up our messes for us. As young boys, we get used to moms always using their Magical Mama Spit™ to slick our wind-blown hair back behind our ears and we get used to their Magic Mama Breath™ blowing the eyelash out of our eyes. Except that as we grow older, the Magic Mama Spit™ turns into dollars (that mom really doesn’t have) that bail us out of bad situations and the Magic Mama Breath™ becomes excuses that magically makes us feel better about the childish decisions that we continue to make.