Keeper'n Me (11 page)

I was never a religious guy. I'd been forced to go to Sunday school in some of the homes I was in and I liked some of the stories about Jesus and how he always looked after kids on accounta I wasn't getting to much looking after as a kid. But I never followed it up. I got old enough to not go to Sunday school anymore. A couple of times me'n Delma went to the church she attended occasionally and I really dug that on accounta the choir was
really funky and alive but I didn't really listen to the preacher at all. Praying and church-going were just something you did when you had to and I didn't see what it had to do with being Indian. Besides, all the ritual I saw around me was far different from what I was used to seeing from people who were supposed to be praying. It all struck me as being pretty close to voodoo.

But Grampa was a big believer. He belonged to a society that called themselves Midewewin. Some of our people called them medicine men and when I heard that I really wanted no part of it. To me medicine men were large painted-up guys with the scary faces shaking rattles and small dead animals around people's heads and sending them off on the warpath. I remember thinking that if I had to go and see one just to stick around White Dog it was gonna be back to black for me.

Stanley tried to explain it all to me one night but it got to be so complicated that I just shut him off in my mind. I figured all I really needed to do to be an Indian was learn to do what everyone else was doing and I'd be okay. I didn't see anybody doing any big ceremonies so I figured it was okay for me to leave it alone. But heading through the dark bush towards the cabin where my grampa lived out his last days got me to thinking about him and his beliefs and the amount of stuff I had to learn about my own people and my own history still.

I could see the lights of the cabin from a long way off. It's a heavy darkness around here. It almost seems like
the rocks and trees and even the water sometimes all soak up whatever light there might be. It kind of explains why the Ojibway got to be such a superstitious bunch and why their legends are filled with all kinds of monsters and spirits.

He was sitting in the doorway smoking his pipe when I walked up.

“Ahnee, Garnet,” he said, “ahnee” being the way we Ojibways greet each other, means howdy and all that.

“Ahnee, Keeper. Boy, you sure look good!”

“Oh, meegwetch, meegwetch,” he said and stuck his hand out. “Feel pretty good now too!”

I watched as he paused to relight his pipe and noticed how his hands didn't shake like I remembered.

“Pretty steady, eh? First thing people notice 'bout us ex-drunks.”

“Must feel good.”

“Hey-yuh. Haven't felt like this in a long, long time.”

Around here the old people, even the women, take to smoking pipes and you have to wait a long time sometimes before they seem to recall they're talking with you and get around to it again. What with smoking their pipes and staring away across the sky like they do, there's always huge holes in the line of talk. Not like black people who keep up the patter nonstop. Indians stare at the sky lots between words. Waiting for the words to fall, I guess. So I waited awhile before he got around to talking again.

“Used to spend lotsa time here once. Old man an' I did lotsa talkin' here.”

“Old man? My grampa you mean?”

“Hey-yuh. Harold. Your grampa. Knew him a long time. Since I was a small boy. He was the lasta the people round here really knew about Midewewin. You heard about that?”

“Not lots. Heard they were medicine men, did lots of ceremonies, stuff like that.”

He laughed just then. It was good to hear. It came from somewhere deep inside him and echoed across the bay.

“Stuff like that. Stuff like that. Well, Midewewin were the people's guardians. All kindsa people gotta have someone lookin' out over the world for 'em, teach em how to walk around in it, show 'em where they gotta go, how to get there. Midewewin did that. Other Indyuns got their teachers an' protectors too, but us, we had Midewewin.

“They used their ceremonies an' rituals to keep the people healthy. Knew all about plants and animals, all the teachin's that come from there. Knew the world. Knew the universe. Knew about everything an' did lotsa prayin' for the people.

“Had a real natchrel way. Made stories an' legends for the people to learn from. Made rules for behavin' meant to keep the people together through anything. Used the pipe, sweat lodge an' prayer. Lotsa prayer.”

“What happened to them?”

“Hmmpfh,” Keeper said, and stared away across the lake for a while before he continued. “Times changed.
Times changed an' the people changed too. When the whiteman came here with all his shiny things the people got distracted. Started lookin' more at the whiteman's world than their own. Pretty soon work an' money an' gettin' those shiny things got to mean more than prayer an' ceremony. See, you look too long at the shiny an' your eyes go funny. Can't see the world like you used to. People didn't see that the ones who carried the knowledge were startin' to die. No one was coming around to ask an' learn. Pretty soon the old ones were all gone and mosta what they knew went with 'em. Works that way sometimes in this world. Gotta starve awhile before you learn to recognize your hunger. People are just now startin' to get the idea they're missin' something. The old ones who knew are gone from here though. There's still teachers around other places though. Still someone to go see.”

He paused to thump his pipe against the cabin wall, and it echoed across the lake like someone beating a small drum way off in the darkness.

“You mean there's no one around here anymore who knows those things?”

There was another long silence. I could hear him breathing deep and long and he started nodding his head up and down.

“Almost no one.” He got up slowly and went into the cabin. I could hear things being moved around and finally the first faint glow of the fire flickered through the door as he opened it and gestured to me.

“Peen-dig-en. Peen-dig-en. Come in. Got somethin' to show you.”

We sat by the fire and he reached down to cradle a large hand drum in his arms. A hand drum is just what the name says. A drum you hold in your hand to play. Ours are made of rounded wood frames from the trunk of a tree and covered with deer hide or moose hide stretched across it and tied all together on the underneath side. Most of the ones I'd seen were plain but the one Keeper held was painted with a bright, intricate design.

“This was your grampa's. Before that it was his grampa's. Been around long time this drum. Maybe three, four hundred years.”

“Where'd you get it?” I asked respectfully, nervous that if he dropped it it might just shatter.

“Harold. He passed it on to me. But it don't belong to me.”

“Who's it belong to?”

“Drum like this always belongs to the people. Same as the songs you sing with it. Old man taught me some of those songs, told me about their meanin'. When he died he left a message with your mother that I was responsible for the drum. Learnin' those things meant I had a responsibility. See, the drum's always gotta have a keeper. Called a drum keeper really.”

“Is that why everyone calls you Keeper?”

“Well, yes, but that's not really why.”

He took his time reloading his pipe and I watched as his face got softer and softer in the flickering light of the
fire. It reminded me of the look on my ma's face when she told me about my dad. He looked over at me for a while before he started to explain.

“Harold, your grampa, was my teacher. Picked me outta all the boys on the reserve. Said I had smarts and courage. I run away from the residential school they sent me to and came back here. I was about ten. He liked it that I wouldn't let them take me away from here. He was a young man then. 'Bout maybe forty-five. So he'd bring me out here on nights like this, make tea an' we'd sit by this fire an' he'd tell me all about the old Midewewin. Talk about the old ways. Told me stories, legends, all kindsa things I never heard before.

“Daytime he took me for walks. Showed me plants and animals. Told me their old names an' what kinda things they could do for the people. Introduced me to all of it for the first time. The world, I mean. While the other boys were out playin', huntin' and fishin' I was out in the bush with the old man. Learned about bear medicine, deer medicine, all the songs for all the animals. He was my friend.”

“Did he teach you to be a Midewewin?”

“No,” Keeper said a little sadly, “no. I walked away. I walked away. Felt like I was missin' out on somethin' big not bein' with my friends so I walked away. Didn't learn enough to be a real teacher.

“But all that knowledge was inside me. Ev'rythin' he gave me, all the things he taught me, ev'rythin' he put inside me stayed right there. Didn't go away. All the time
I was runnin' around with my friends it didn't go away. I'd be looking at somethin' an' remember what it was called by the old people and what it was used for. Wanted it all to go away but it didn't.

“Got older. Still wouldn't go away. I learned too much too deep. Every time I'd see him around I'd try'n go the other way. But him he always had a waya meetin' my eyes. Never said nothin' all that time but his eyes spoke lots. Drilled right into me. I knew what he was tryin' to tell me but me, I didn't wanna hear it. All I wanted was my friends. All the parties, the adventures, all the stories. When he died I was drinkin' it up with your uncle Buddy. When we heard we got even drunker. Least, I did. Was your ma finally told me about me bein' the drum keeper. I knew some of it. Learned it before I walked away on accounta I think he was trainin' me for it but I didn't know the whole thing.

“In our way we believe that the drum holds the heartbeat of the people. The songs you sing with it are very sacred. Nothin' to be played around with. When you sing you're joinin' the heartbeat of the people with the heartbeat of the universe. It's a blessing. You're blessing the land and the water and the air with the pure, clear spirit of the people. In return you're gettin' big blessings from the land. Food, shelter, water. It's a big thing you do when you sing with the drum. The keeper of the drum's one who's learned the prayer songs like the old man taught me. Knows how to give blessings. So the keeper's gotta be one who lives life in a good way. Pure, clean way.
Keep the drum pure, heartbeat of the people pure and strong, and me I knew this.

“Pretty soon I was feelin' real guilty. Like a traitor. Knew there was no way I could shake off responsibility for the drum an' I knew how important it was for the people but I felt too guilty over walkin' away an' not learnin' the rest of it. Didn't think I was worthy no more and bein' drunk started to feel better.

“Reason they all started to callin' me Keeper was on accounta I'd be all drunk an' cryin' about your grampa an' I'd try an' tell 'em I was the keeper of the drum. They just laughed. Don't blame 'em, really, but it still felt like a big knife in the belly. They laughed and started callin' me Keeper as a big joke.

“Couldn't sober up 'cause I figured it was too late. Thought I was unworthy an' after a long time I was too guilty, too scared an' then just too damn drunk to care. Too damn drunk to care.

“But one day I got tired. Tired of the guilt, tired of bein' drunk, sick, bein' all dried up inside. So I went an' talked with your ma and went away.

“Thought about you when I got back. Remembered you coming here that first day, lookin' all strange, smelly kinda. Watched you tryin' to move around here. Tryin' to find yourself. Saw you tryin' real hard to be Indyun. Kinda reminded me of me. Not as cute maybe, but me anyway.”

He looked away, a distant, vacant stare that he held for a long time, beating his pipe against his leg slow and
regular like the drum he was holding in his lap. We could hear the loons calling out to each other across the lake, and when he looked over at me again he was smiling.

“Let's go back out,” he said, getting up slowly and lifting an old sweater from a hook by the door. “Sure were a funny-lookin' thing when you stepped into your brother's cabin that day. Heh, heh, heh.”

We settled ourselves on a rough-hewn bench by the door. Both of us gazed upward almost automatically at the stars that were shining like little chips of ice and a big orange moon that was just starting to rise in the east.

“Hey-yuh. Funniest-lookin' thing I seen in years. But, important thing is you're home. Gone long time, you. Learned diff'rent ways. Ways that stick on you, make you move an' behave diff'rent, look diff'rent even though you're one of us. A Raven. Anishanabe. White Dog Indyun. But you, you need a guide right now. Someone to help you find your way around. Help you learn to see things Indyun instead of white … or black even. Heh, heh heh. An' me, well, I need someone to help me too.”

“Help you? Help you what?”

“Hmmpfh. Been gone long time myself. Could use a good guide too. See, you'n me got a lot in common. Lotsa things the same. You, you're tryin' to learn to fit in, tryin' to be at home here, tryin' to win back all them years got stolen on you. Me, same thing. Got a lotta years to win back.

“Takes lotta courage to come back here. Brave boy, you. An' I can tell you got smarts by the way you're
always watchin' things go on around you. Never say nothin', just watchin'. Learnin'. Tryin' to see with diff'rent eyes. S'good. Lot of us we try 'n tell each other how much we know about things, how much Indyun we are, but all the time we're scared inside on accounta we know we don't know much. So we use our mouth to hide our real feelin's, our lacka knowin'. Not you. Learned lots already by bein' silent. S'good.

“Kinda like me when your grampa took me up here. Said I had courage an' smarts too. And we're the same now as men. Both of us lookin' to find our way back, both tryin' to win back some time got taken away. You, you need someone to teach you about your own people. An' me, me I kinda need to pay back a debt. Need to give back what the old man gave me. Need to become the drum keeper he wanted me to be. Find another teacher around to keep on learnin' and need to pass on whatever I learn.