: She told me to get into the car which I did reluctantly, but I
: had my ears turned up as far as they could go. She replied,
: and chose her words carefully, "Why of course they
: did, and isn't that something? " "Imagine
: "those" people actually being brave enough to use
: that restroom!" I nearly wet myself laughing, because
: the look on the serviceman's face, said it all. It was on
: that day that I was able to identify what hate was and is.
: I understood that hate was a deep root and it poisoned all
: who came into contact with it, if entertained long enough.

Dear Bliss:

I laughed so hard, I cried! Good for your mother. Lucky you to see the truth in so much good humor!

The schools often ask for "talks" about Indian history and the way things were. One time ago, I did that. Once with about 20 children in one classroom, we were talking about oral tradition. I said to them: "Okay, you are all explorers, and your ship has come into this beautiful place. You get on shore and walk up a hill and see me standing here. I am Indian. You have never seen anything like me before, and I haven't personally seen anything like you. We start trying to communicate and realize we don't speak similar languages. Through some sign language and eye contact, I get that you are asking me "what is this place?" I tell you the name n-dah-kee-na. We finish our non-verbal conversation, and you go back to your boat. That night, as you sit at the Captain's table, you begin to write in your travel log. You write down the name of this place."

Then I asked all of the children to write down the name of this place.

All of the children wrote something on their paper.

Now, I asked, what did you write? I copied onto the chalkboard all of the spellings for n-dah-kee-na. There were 12 spellings in the room.

Of course, then, the children wanted to know which one was correct.

I shrugged and said: I don't know. You are the one with the written language, not me. But, I said, I will tell you what it means. The word n-dah-kee-na means "our place." And I circled my hands around the room to include all of them.

And there was a very quiet room for a while as the understanding sank in.

Now, read this:

"Extending across most of northern New England into the southern part of the Canadian Maritimes, the Abenaki called their homeland Ndakinna meaning "our land." The eastern Abenaki were concentrated in Maine east of New Hampshire's White Mountains, while the western Abenaki lived west of the mountains across Vermont and New Hampshire to the eastern shores of Lake Champlain. The southern boundaries of the Abenaki homeland were near the present northern border of Massachusetts excluding the Pennacook country along the Merrimack River of southern New Hampshire. The maritime Abenaki occupied the St. Croix and the St. John's River Valleys near the border between Maine and New Brunswick. New England settlement and war forced many of the Abenaki to retreat north into Quebec where two large communities formed at St. Francois and Becancour near Trois-Rivieves."

Notice this: past tense.

called
were concentrated
lived
were near
occupied
forced

Wrong.

I finally started to tell people who asked for stories and information that I would not speak in past tense. Ask me what is alive and well, and now. There was a look of surprise on their faces. And, QUIT USING PAST TENSE IN WRITING. Look for living history. Generations of "Americans" have been reading this crap and it is now ingrained in their heads that we WERE here once, and now are GONE. Banished to dust bowls and scraps of river edges, true. But there is laughter in them bowls...you can hear it late in the day and over coffee at every broken kitchen table spilling out onto the cracked linoleum. Ha ha ha.

One time, one of my young students asked: Were you an Indian? What kind of house did you have? What did you hunt with? What did you eat?

Past tense.

I looked at the child and laughed.

No, I said, I am living here and now. I live in a house like you, and eat the same things as you.

Still, we are not the same. It doesn't matter how we define our differences. The only thing that matters is how we share our differences.

.....................

from Reservation Blues, 1995, Sherman Alexie.
(THANK YOU MR. ALEXIE for being here and now, and letting me borrow a few notes.)

"Just then, Big Mom played the loneliest chord that the band had ever heard. It drifted out of her bedroom, floated across the room, and landed at the feet of Coyote Springs. It crawled up their clothes and into their ears. Junior fainted.

"What in the hell was that?" Victor asked.

Big Mom walked out of the bedroom carrying a guitar made of a 1965 Malibu and the blood of a child killed at Wounded Knee in 1890.

"Listen," Thomas said.

Big Mom hit the chord again with more force, and it knocked everybody to the ground. Everybody except Junior, who was already passed out on the ground.

"Please," Chess said, but she didn't know if she wanted Big Mom to please, quit playing, or please, don't stop.

Big Mom hit that chord over and over, until Coyote Springs had memorized its effects on their bodies. Junior had regained consciousness long enough to remember his failures, before the force of the music knocked him out again.

"Enough!" Victor shouted. "I can't hear myself think!"

"There," Big Mom said to Victor. "Have you learned anything?"

"I've learned that a really big guitar makes a really big noise."

"Is that all?"

"What do you want me to say? I keep waiting for you to call me Grasshopper and ask me to snatch some goddamn pebble from your hand."

Thomas stood up and reached for Big Mom's guitar.

"Patience," Big Mom said and pushed his hand away.

"I can play that chord," Thomas said. "But I need your guitar to do it."

"All Indians can play that chord," Big Mom said. "It's the chord created especially for us. But you have to play it on your own instrument, Thomas. You couldn't even lift my guitar."

...................................................

Afternote:

Stealing each other's songs is alot different than stealing cattle. Thing is, when you steal a song, you still have to be able to play it on your own instrument. There are strings of songs playing in "our place." Unlike cuts from a recording, they play forever, endlessly connecting the past into the now.

Big Mom

by Sherman Alexie

There's a grandmother talking to me
There's a grandmother talking to you
There's a grandmother singing for me
There's a grandmother singing for you

And if you stop and listen
You might hear what you been missing
And if you stop and listen
You might hear what you been missing

And I hear Big Mom
Telling me another story
And I hear Big Mom
Singing me another song

And she says

I'll be coming back
I'll be coming back
I'll be coming back for you
I'll be coming back
I'll be coming back
I'll be coming back for you
I'll always come back for you.