Running Drum Background

Hi: I am Buster Waeland but named Running Drum. Named by my Cherokee/Choctaw surrogate big sister Chenoa (White-Dove) who is actually much younger and far more intuitive than I. She recognized the 'Indian' in me a long while ago before we found out what follows. She, like me, lives for horses, - our four legged brothers and sisters, (Soguili),- only she has far more knowledge than I and she has a Small Paints & Quarters Breeding Center, The BreezyJ, in Oklahoma, whereas I live in England. Yup, England, born and bred !

I've had a strange and muddled life, and a particularly odd time in my youth where I was taught the basics and given my foundations by my Grandfather. When I was most confused and frustrated by religious and moral issues; when I believed that Horses were my friends and people told me that I was foolish; he always told me that what confused me was the 'Indian' in me. Since he was an amazing prankster and happily pulled my leg all the time, I naturally thought his comments to be a joke. But as I grew wiser and more confident in my own standing and way of life, I did occasionally wonder, but whenever I confronted him directly by asking where we (as a family) came from, he would tell me "Bedfordshire Fool". 'Fool' was his fond nickname for me. He went to join our ancestors in his 97th year.

Although I had worked as a living with Horses since I was 14 years old,by Chance my Horsemanship took me into Circus in Britain when I was 17 years old, and I have remained within show business ever since and up until 1990 worked principally with Horses.

In 1990 my wife and I had a very serious accident and I retired from all work to bring up my young family and look after my seriously disabled wife. In 1995 I was able to work again but couldn't commit myself back with Soguili because I was unsure of the permanency of my wife's recovery but I did go back into show business. In 1999 I was diagnosed with advanced COPD, Emphysema and told not to work with horses any more because of the dusts from grooming and bedding. Also the exertion of riding would further damage my lungs.

Back in 1997 I had had a bad fall where amongst other things I broke my back but during recovery I started to write and I now am a novelist. It was these accidents that took me by chance into writing and it was from my writing that I found my friend Chenoa. During my working life I had traveled all over Europe and the US, Canada and elsewhere, and I made friends.

Wherever I went my attitudes seemed odd to most, exceptions were few. My Sioux friends however named me Sukawaka Wastelake (Loves Horses) and thought my style in all ways was somewhat 'Indian'. When I made a friend of Chenoa 'she told me' that I had Native American blood in me and she was so certain that she predicted that one day I 'would know for sure'.

{Working again with 'Soguilli in spite of back injuries and COPD. Above is my Brother "Blue" Pure bred Arab Colt. 15 hands and just 3 years old. Probably get to 16 hands. 2003}

[Graphic above from Chenoa, Wa-do.]

Well, Chenoa was right and Grandfather had not been joking at all, and he must have known.

I now know that in the mid 1600's the Principals of my family left England in some haste, having fallen foul of the Crown. They shipped to the US but did fight with the Militia against the French. Once established as a proper family they stood with The Colonials against the British.

It seems that one family member decided to go West, but in doing so he met and married a Homesteader's daughter. She had been taken in and adopted by the Homesteaders, having been abandoned by a gang of slavers.

She was a Cherokee/Sioux child. That branch of the family expanded and in the mid 1800's there was a return to England and a new branch founded here. I am a twig of that branch.

{Blue at 15:2 hands, November 2004}

I am Ahuli-Adisi, -Running Drum-, so named by my dear friend Chenoa. Of course I don't claim, in any way, to be Cherokee or Sioux, but I am immensely proud of this ancestral heritage and finally it accounts for my spiritual, moral, and practical self.