Conversation

Last night, Annie handed me the phone and said, "Here, my mom wants to talk to you." I was kind of hesitant, it was getting late and I really didn't feel like talking on the phone to anyone.

Her mom said, "I've got to read something to you."

"Sure, go ahead."

What she read to me was an account either by a merchant or a government agent from the 1830's. The person writing explained how they wanted the Ojibwa of Keewinaw (sp?) Peninsula in Michigan to make their living more by agriculture instead of hunting and gathering. Their reasoning was that if they made their living by agriculture a lot more of them could live in one area. And this would really benefit the French fur traders.

After reading it, she responded with, "Sometimes I just want to put my head down and my hands over my ears. I feel so alone in this culture."

I came back with, "I know what you mean. The population of the United States has reached 3 million people and the experts won't even mention the relationship between food availability and population growth. It's just insane."

"Aint it, though."

"You know, though, despite all the madness I'm feeling pretty good right now," I said.

"Why is that?" She asked.

"I'm reading the part in The Story of B where Shirin is teaching Jared about animism out in the forest."

"Oh really! I'm so glad that you mentioned B to me. I need to read that the way I'm feeling right now." She said.

30 minutes later we hung up.

I hope she is feeling better today. And It just amazes me how "like minds" work. Not many people would recognize that making the Ojibwa dependent on Agriculture is a bad thing.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

More quotes from The Story of B:

"We make our journey in the company of others. The deer, the rabbit, the bison, and the quail walk before us, the lion, the eagle, the wolf, the vulture and the hyena walk behind us. All our paths lie together in the hand of god and none is wider than any other or favored above any other. The worm that creeps beneath your foot is making its journey across the hand of god as surely as you are.

"Remember that your tracks are one strand of the web woven endlessly in the hand of god. They're tied to those of the mouse in the field, the eagle on the mountain, the crab in its hold, the lizard beneath its rock. The leaf that falls to the ground a thousand miles away touches your life. The impress of your foot in the soil is felt through a thousand generations." pg. 185

On teachings: The Leaver peoples of the world have been trying to tell you these things for centuries, but they still remain secrets. Certainly we haven't hidden them--far from it. We're not like high-degree members of the Freemasons or Templars or the Ku Klux Klan, whisperings secrets in locked rooms an exacting promises of silence from those who hear them. Wherever people behave that way, you can be sure they're guarding either very paltry secrets or simple matters of fact, like where the Allies planned to invade Europe at the end of World War Two. Real secrets can be kept by publishing them on billboards." pg.188

And the Leaver vision: "The word is a sacred place and a sacred process, and we're part of it." Pg 189

Animism Books Ishmael