Read Online Keeper'n Me by Richard Wagamese - Free Book Online

how. It’s tradition that makes you Indyun. Sing and dance forever but if you’re not practicin’ tradition day by day you’re not really bein’ Indyun. Old man told me one time he said, the very last time you got up in the mornin’ and said a quiet prayer of thanks for the day you been given was the very last time you were an Indyun. Then he said, the very last time you got handed some food and bowed your head and said a prayer of thanks and asked for the strength you got from that food to be used to help someone around you, well, that was the very last time you were an Indyun too. And he told me he said, the very last time you did somethin’ for someone without bein’ asked, bein’ thanked or tellin’ about it was the very last time you were an Indyun. See, it’s all respect, kindness, honesty and sharin’. Built right in. Do that all the time and boy, you just dance and sing up a real storm next time. Heh, heh, heh
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    That’s what we gotta pass on. ’Cause tradition’ll keep you goin’ when you’re livin’ it. Us we need to remember these things
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Keep ’em alive inside me. Live ’em so they stay strong. Lotsa kids comin’ back nowadays really need to he shown. Tough thing to do when the kids are forty-four, twenty-five or whatever
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    Nowadays the whiteman comes in lotsa diff’rent ways. Oh, they still come with their schools and their foster homes, but we got some of our own teachers and social workers now, so kinda gettin’ better there. But they still come for the kids. They come with their TV, money, big inventions and ideas. They come with big promises ’bout livin’ in the world, with their politics and their welfare. They come with their rap music, break dancin’ and funny ways of dressin’. All kinds of shiny things. Kids get all excited, funny in the head ’bout things, wanna go chasin’ after all that stuff. Tradition? Ah, it’s just borin’ stuff for old guys like me can’t rap dance. Somethin’ you gotta do when you ain’t got no other choice. That’s how they come nowadays. On the sly. Harder for kids to come back from these things than from them schools or foster homes sometimes
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    That’s why we gotta pass it on. Always gotta be someone around who knows. Always gotta be someone around to catch ’em when they land here all owl-eyed and scared, askin’ questions, tryin’ to find if they belong here still. If they wanna stick around. Always gotta be someone who knows the kindness built into tradition. Ease ’em back slow. Got the Indyun all scraped offa their insides, carryin’ ’round big hurts an’ bruises. Poke around too much you hurt ’em an’ they run away. So you bring ’em back from the inside out. Nothin’ in this world ever grew from the outside in. That’s why I help the boy understand. He learned ’bout respect before he ever learned to sing or dance. Learned to be kind and share before he learned to tan a hide or
how to hunt. Learned to be honest before I let him be a storyteller. Learned about bein’ Indyun, about himself. That way he’ll survive anything
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    He looked funny enough when he got here wearin’ all those strange things and havin’ a head of hair looked like a cat been through the dryer, smellin’ like fruit and talkin’ funny. Guess if he could survive walkin’ around lookin’ and smellin’ like that, learnin’ to live an’ learn off the land was gonna be simple. Heh, heh, heh
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    The first thing most people notice about us Indians is how we’re laughing most of the time. It doesn’t really matter whether we’re all dressed up in traditional finery or in bush jackets and gumboots, seems like a smile and big roaring guffaw is everywhere with us. Used to be that non-Indians thought we were just simple. You know, typical kinda goofy-grinning