In the days far beyond the reach of memory, there was purpose to everything the people thought, and believed, and did. There was also purpose in what the people were as a group and as individual men and women. Girls grew up and became the mothers and nurturers of children, perhaps the most important purpose of all. Boys grew up to be the providers and protectors, also called hunter-warriors. Whatever girls had to learn to become good women, and whatever boys had to learn to become good men, was all intended to make them useful to the family, to the community, and to themselves.
A boy was left to his mother, his grandmothers, and his aunts—and really to the influence of all the women in the village—until he was strong enough to pull back a bow, usually around the age of five. During those years he learned many necessary lessons under the tutelage of women. After that he was guided onto the path of the hunter-warrior and placed under the tutelage of men. There was a reason for this. It was said that a boy learned the way of the hunter-warrior from his father and grandfathers and uncles, but from his mothers and grandmothers he learned the courage and compassion he would need on that path.
Lessons on the path to becoming a hunter and warrior were in two different realms: those that could be seen and felt and those that could not. Weapons and how to make and use them were in the first realm. So when he was strong enough a boy was given his own bow and a set of arrows. By the time he was five he had already watched his father, grandfathers, and uncles carrying and using those very necessary weapons. Other weapons included the war lance, the buffalo lance, the knife, the sling for throwing stones, and the curved rabbit stick for hunting smaller animals. But of all of these it was the bow and the arrow that most defined the hunter-warrior.
No one knew exactly when the bow and the arrow had come to the people. For certain, it was told, the bow was a gift from the moon and the arrow a gift of the sun. Since the moon was a woman, the bow was female. Likewise, since the sun was a man, the arrow was male. It was so because all things worked best in balance. Up needed down, night needed day, cold needed hot, good needed bad, and so on. And so it was that impetuousness needed patience. If boys had anything in abundance it was impetuousness, and if there was anything they would need in abundance to be good hunters and warriors, it was patience. That was the challenge for those who taught them. But those teachers often reached beyond themselves to train impetuous boys.
A certain boy was his father’s pride, mainly because he had two older sisters and his father had more or less given up hope of having a son. Not that he loved his daughters less, but because a man always wanted to pass on his line through a son. The boy was named Little Arm by his grandmother, for he was slight and probably would not grow to be as tall as his stalwart father. But as Hawk Wing’s father counseled, the size of the man was a poor second to the size of the will in the man.
So it was that Little Arm began his journey on the path of the hunter-warrior. He was not as strong as other boys his age, nor could he run as fast. But when it came to the bow and arrow, he would develop a skill second to none. It began with his grandfather, Wolf Eyes.
Wolf Eyes was Little Arm’s mother’s father, and he was not a tall man. But his reputation and his accomplishments as a hunter and warrior were as notable as any, and likely more than most, and he was known above all for his patience. In Little Arm the old man saw himself, and he became the boy’s first and most important teacher.
A familiar sight for a few years was the little boy leaving the village on the heels of his grandfather. Little Arm would follow his grandfather anywhere, it was said among the people. And the boy was willing to follow the old man to more than a place or a landmark—he also followed his grandfather to a way of being, to the realm of the lessons that could not be seen or felt. In this way he became a good man.
By the time Little Arm was seven his grandfather had taught him the basics of making his own bow and arrows. It began with finding the right kind of wood. They prowled creek and river bottoms to find slender ash trees. The boy looked for trees that were straight, as thick as his grandfather’s forearm, and stood at least as tall as a grown man.
The old man chose chokecherry saplings for hunting arrows and a thicker softwood like river willow for war arrows. Every kind of feather would do for fletching so long as it was long enough—except for owl and eagle. Goose feathers were preferable for arrows used in winter or wet weather, since their natural oils repelled water. Along riverbanks they found the hard stones—chert and flint—for arrow points. At first Wolf Eyes shaped them for him, but eventually Little Arm would make his own. By the time he was ten, he was making his own bows and arrows with a quality that surpassed most boys older than he.
By then he had also mastered the basic techniques of shooting, but his marksmanship was not as good as his craftsmanship. Both Wolf Eyes and Hawk Wing saw that Little Arm was frustrated because his skill with the bow was not as good as other boys. His grandfather knew that the basic problem was a lack of patience.
One day, after he missed what he thought was an easy shot at a rabbit, the boy threw down his bow in frustration. “I will never be as good as everyone else!” he exclaimed.
Wolf Eyes waited until the boy had retrieved his bow. “Then I guess we’ll have to take this matter up with the grasshoppers,” he told his grandson.
The next day, in the middle of a warm summer afternoon, the old man took his grandson to a meadow not far from the village. Wolf Eyes had chosen that particular spot for two reasons: there were plenty of grasshoppers and no curious onlookers.
Grasshoppers are the kinds of small beings that can be so plentiful no one bothers to look at each one of them. Rather, there is a tendency to perceive them as a bothersome group. But the characteristics that made them invaluable to Wolf Eyes—and to generations of Lakota warriors and archers—was their wariness and erratic flying. They were always on the alert since they were the favorite food of just about any bird that flew, and for that very reason they never flew in a straight line. They were masters at the art of changing direction because their very survival depended on how well and how often they did. These were characteristics that seemed simple enough, until a boy tried to outwit and outmaneuver even one grasshopper.
As the old man and his grandson walked across the meadow, grasshoppers took wing all around them. It was dizzying just to watch them flutter about, making a strange little buzzing noise as they flew. Wolf Eyes stopped and put his hand on the boy’s shoulder.
“Let us stand and be still,” he told the boy. “Here is what I want you to do after the grasshoppers settle down. Stand quietly, as we are now, and do not move no matter what. Then, after a while has passed, take one step. One very, very slow step. If you make grasshoppers fly, then you are not moving slowly enough.”
Though puzzled, the boy understood the instructions.
“I will wait for you in the shade over there,” said the old man. “Wait for the grasshoppers to settle down, then take a step. Take as many steps as you can without scaring them. Remember, if even just one flies, you are moving too fast.”
As Wolf Eyes found a comfortable place to sit under a nearby oak tree and watch, Little Arm looked around and waited for the grasshoppers to settle back down again. The nearest ones were a pebble’s toss away. But as he knew well, the slightest sound or movement sent them flying. After several long moments of waiting and standing like a stone, he lifted a foot. The entire field of grasshoppers flew up, filling the air with an annoying buzz. The boy took a deep, exasperated breath and stopped. From his grandfather he heard not a word.
The boy waited longer the second time. An errant breeze tugged at loose wisps of his hair and gnats buzzed around his nose and eyes. He nearly lifted a hand to swat them away but stopped himself. Instead he calmed himself with a slow, deep breath, and then concentrated on the heel of his right foot. Then ever so slightly he brought up the heel, but no more than the width of his finger. Next he lifted all but his big toe. Balance would be critical, once he lifted his toe off the ground. If he lost his balance he would likely frighten the grasshoppers. Which is exactly what happened. The meadow came alive again with a flurry of flying grasshoppers with buzzing wings. Little Arm decided that the trick was not to step so far, but to keep his step short.
The next time he tried he managed a short step without frightening a single grasshopper. But when he tried again he was a bit too satisfied, became careless, and the air above the meadow was full of grasshoppers again.
That night, sitting at his grandfather’s fire, Little Arm vowed that he could learn to move so slowly that no grasshopper would hear or see him.
“Summer is nearly over,” his grandfather said, “and by the middle of autumn most of the grasshoppers will be gone.”
So the next day and the next and for many days after that, Wolf Eyes took his grandson to wherever the grasshoppers gathered, in order to learn the valuable lessons that grasshoppers could teach. After many days Little Arm was able to move more than 20 paces across a field without frightening a single grasshopper. He had learned to control his movements to slow them down until it seemed he was not moving at all.
Before he could become too pleased with himself, the old man revealed the next part of the lesson. “Now,” he said, “you must find one grasshopper, one that is away from his fellows, and you must do so with your bow strung and an arrow on the string, ready to shoot. After you are five to six paces away, frighten the grasshopper into taking wing, then shoot at it.”
Little Arm was not overly concerned with this turn of events. He had, after all, learned the art of stealth. What could be more difficult than that?
“Your task is to pull, aim, and shoot as soon as the grasshopper flies. You must hit it before it alights again,” the old man went on. “Your stealth must get you close, and then you will work on improving your skill with the bow.”
By the next afternoon, Little Arm was more frustrated than he had ever been in his life. Sneaking up on a grasshopper was one thing. Hitting it as it flew was next to impossible. Every grasshopper had the same annoying habit. Each flew in one direction for less than a heartbeat, and then abruptly turned. There was no predicting which way it would turn. As a result any shot he attempted went awry. None of the arrows he shot at a dodging grasshopper came close.
Shoulders slumping, the boy returned and dropped down next to his grandfather, who was sitting in the shade of a tree. “I will never hit one of those things,” he whined. “It is much too difficult.”
Without a word, Wolf Eyes rose slowly to his feet. Taking his bow from its case, he strung it and slid an arrow out of his quiver.
“Follow me,” he said to the boy, and walked into a grassy swale.
Little Arm did as he was told, keeping a close eye on his grandfather as he held the bow at the ready. After a long pause, the old man shuffled his feet and sent a grasshopper flying. With smooth, practiced motion born of years of shooting bows and arrows, he pulled and released. The boy had to concentrate on the flashing arrow and was astonished when it came no less than a finger width from hitting the insect.
“Never is a word that should not be used by anyone who wants to be a hunter and warrior,” Wolf Eyes said gently. “Except to say ‘I will never give up.’ I have hit a grasshopper, perhaps twice. I will never stop trying, so I may hit one again. The important thing is this. Shoot to hit one. Do not shoot to come close.”
Almost every day until the last days of summer gave way to autumn and the grasshoppers were fewer and fewer, Little Arm prowled the meadows and watercourses. No grasshoppers fell to his arrows, but his eyes were picking up and following the movement of each one he shot at. Furthermore, he was learning to withdraw an arrow from the quiver and place it on the string without looking, since his concentration was on the grasshoppers.
In the late autumn and winter the boy accompanied his father and grandfathers as they pursued elk and deer. Though he carried his bow and arrows along each time, he was expected to simply watch and learn from experienced hunters. Closer to home he was free to hunt rabbits anytime he chose. Owing to days of practice on grasshoppers, he was able to bring home rabbits more often than not. Rabbits were fast, he told himself, but nowhere near as fast and unpredictable as grasshoppers. He was anxious for summer and more practice on the wily little insects.
Every summer for the next three years Little Arm pursued grasshoppers. He became adept at an approach so slow and deliberate that it seemed to anyone watching that he was not moving at all. The boy could walk across a grassy meadow full of the insects without disturbing a single one. To Wolf Eyes it was plain to see that his grandson’s skill at handling his bow and arrows was improving, nearly day by day. No other boy his age was as smooth and quick.
Little Arm was growing just as the other boys were. He was filling out and becoming stronger, but he would always be slight and shorter than boys his own age. Even as his grandfather Wolf Eyes continued to quietly advise the boy, an uncle—a man known for his endurance—taught Little Arm to develop his stamina. Grass Runner’s ability as a long distance runner was known far and wide, and his physical stature was the same as the boy’s.
“Everyone has an ability that sets him apart from others,” Wolf Eyes told the boy. “Your uncle is not the biggest or the strongest man in the village. But the bigger or stronger men cannot run without stopping like he can. Endurance and stamina are a different kind of strength.”
With those words ringing in his ears, Little Arm followed his uncle across meadows and up and down hills. Speed was not their goal, however. The boy learned that a steady pace could conserve his strength. The more he ran, the stronger his legs and his lungs became. All in all, in spite of his small size, Little Arm was developing into a young man with formidable physical skills.
But every summer and autumn, bow and arrows in hand, Little Arm pursued the elusive grasshoppers. At the end of every autumn Wolf Eyes could see improvement in the boy’s abilities. Now there was no one, man or boy, who was as smooth or as quick with a bow. In the autumn of his 16th year, those abilities would save his older sister’s life.
White Shell Woman was nearly two years older, with many suitors who came calling, young men eager to weave themselves into her awareness. So much so that White Shell could not wander any distance from her parents’ lodge without someone accosting her. For that reason, when her mother sent her to pick chokecherries one day, she dispatched Little Arm to accompany her. She knew her son would guard his sister well.
But on this day it was not an anxious suitor who was interested in the comely young woman, it was a large mountain lion with intense yellow eyes. Little Arm and his sister were far enough away from the village for the big cat not to fear the presence of people, and for some reason they had not taken a dog with them. Although he kept watch for any kind of danger as his sister talked amiably and filled her bags with chokecherries, Little Arm did not see the tawny animal lying flat in the grass. This was because it was the same color as the grass, and it was not moving.
The long-tailed cats were numerous across the land and were known as ambush hunters. They could wait interminably for unsuspecting prey to get close to them. As Shell Woman finished at one chokecherry tree, she tied up her full bag, opened an empty one, and walked toward the next tree. Just beyond that tree lay the cat.
Little Arm followed his sister, his eyes probing shrubs and thickets nearby. Fortunately his bow was strung. He took a second arrow from his quiver as he listened to his sister’s chatter, and placed it in his bow hand. At the moment he was mostly concerned that one of the young men interested in his sister might jump out from the brush, so he was not entirely surprised when he noticed a slight movement out of the corner of his eye. Instinctively he raised his bow and flicked an arrow toward the string.
Something long and large erupted from the grass, a blurred shadow hurling itself toward Shell Woman. Without a thought, Little Arm pulled his bow and released the arrow. In the next instant, even as the arrow struck its target, another arrow was on the string. In the instant after that, it was a flash barely seen in its short flight.
The mortally wounded cat collided with Shell Woman, who had her back to her attacker and could not see it. The collision sent her into the chokecherry tree as the cat fell, its life already draining. Little Arm drew another arrow, placed himself between the fallen lion and his sister, and released the third arrow into the struggling animal’s throat. Though the enraged lion rose on trembling legs, it was too weak to move. Emitting a low growl, it toppled on its side, no more to rise.
Shell Woman’s only injuries were scratches to her face when the lion had shoved her into the chokecherry thicket. Back in the village she told her mother and other women how her younger brother had killed the lion and saved her life. Men hurried to the thicket and found the carcass. It was one of the largest lions ever seen, but more astonishing was that two of Little Arm’s arrows were buried in its heart. An extraordinary feat of marksmanship.
For days the village was buzzing with talk about Little Arm’s victory over the lion. His grandfather and two other old men skinned the animal and the hide was tanned. In the meantime Little Arm went hunting to get away from the sudden attention. His sister told the story of her younger brother’s brave act to anyone who asked.
In the middle days of autumn Little Arm’s family invited everyone in the village to a feast to honor their youngest child and only son. Though thoroughly embarrassed by the attention, the boy endured the festivities to please his parents. He did not expect the two gifts he was given. First, the tanned hide of the lion had been made into a bow case and arrow quiver, the product of the exquisite skills of his grandfathers and grandmothers. It was the finest anyone had ever seen, decorated with porcupine quills dyed red, yellow, and blue.
The second gift was nothing the boy could carry in his hand, and it was more important than any object he could own. He was given a new name to signify he had left his boyhood behind. He would be known as Yellow Eyes, a name that would link his accomplishment with the strength and spirit of the lion.
After the feasting and dancing was over, the women in his family asked Yellow Eyes to help with a few tasks. It was not that they were unable to do the tasks on their own; they wanted him to spend quiet moments with them to learn that humility was the path to being a good man. A lesson he took to heart.
When winter came, his father invited him along as several warriors went on patrol to the edges of their territories, and thus he was no longer regarded as a boy. He was now a young man, though he was reminded that he had far to go to attain the kind of accomplishments and gain the experience of the mature warriors in the village.
His grandfather Wolf Eyes’s advice was simple: “Do not forget what you learned from the grasshoppers.”
Two years after he killed the mountain lion and saved his sister, he got the chance to prove his mettle as a warrior and show how well he remembered that lesson.
He and his closest friend Elk Knife were on their way home from an autumn hunt, pulling deer carcasses on drag poles. In an area where there were no villages, the barest whiff of smoke came on the breeze. Assuming that enemies were about, the two young men hid the carcasses and set out to learn who had made a fire. Following the faint odor of smoke, they came to a creek along which stood several thin groves of trees. From one of the groves rose a thin wisp of smoke, barely seen among the bare branches. The two friends hid themselves in a swatch of tall grass and watched. It was late in the day, and it was apparent that the four men they saw in the trees were making camp for the night. Voices drifted on the breeze, speaking words they could not understand.
As sundown came and dusk settled over the land, the soft glow of a small fire could be seen, even though the flames burned inside a pit dug into the ground. Around the camp four strangers were visible as they moved about, and the smell of roasting meat was easily detected. Darkness came and the fire was extinguished, a sure sign that the strangers were being cautious.
“What shall we do?” whispered Elk Knife.
“You must go back to the village,” decided Yellow Eyes. “Tell our war leader that enemies are in our territory. I will keep watch until you return with other warriors.”
“I will not reach the village until morning,” Elk Knife pointed out. “Do not forget that there are four of them, and only one of you.”
Elk Knife departed and Yellow Eyes considered what he should do. When daylight came the strangers would certainly encroach toward the village. If so, there was little he could do to stop them, since he was outnumbered. A thought entered his mind, but he immediately dismissed it. It returned, though, and after several moments it began to make sense. If he could sneak in and take the strangers’ weapons, they might leave.
What he was thinking of doing was extremely risky, to say the least. If the strangers were seasoned warriors, as they probably were, it would not be easy to get close, and it would be next to impossible to take their weapons. But after more long moments of pondering, trying to talk himself out of taking a foolish risk, Yellow Eyes could not ignore the challenge.
He was no more than a long arrow cast from the strangers’ camp. So he worked quietly. Though the night was cool he stripped down to only his breechclout and moccasins. Then he rubbed himself thoroughly with dirt to mask his scent. Deciding that it would be best to carry as little as possible, he left his bow and arrows and lance behind. With only his knife in its sheath at his belt, and heart pounding heavily, Yellow Eyes started walking toward the strangers’ camp.
His eyes were well accustomed to the dark, and fortunately it was a moonless night. From the hills and prairies all around came the usual night sounds of coyotes barking and wolves howling. Most of the insects were gone by this time. After several deliberate steps, he would pause and listen for sounds from the camp. In this manner he proceeded until he was close enough to toss a stone at the four forms he saw beneath robes. They appeared as not much more than shadows, but nonetheless discernible. Edging closer with one deliberate step after another, he stopped when he could hear them breathing. One of them was snoring lightly, and all of them seemed to be asleep.
Yellow Eyes stood motionless for a very long while, studying the camp. The strangers were lying head to toe in a sort of circle around the cold ashes in the fire pit. He risked several more slow, almost imperceptible steps, waited, and then took several more. From his new and closer vantage point, he could discern that each man’s weapons were behind him, on the side away from the fire pit. Each seemed to have a bow and arrows, a war club, and a lance. A simple plan formed in his mind.
From the position of the Three Sisters star formation in the sky, morning was a long way off. But he wanted to be gone by the time dawn broke. He would move silently sunwise around the sleeping strangers, squat at each form to take the weapons, and move on. As long as he made absolutely no noise and moved as though he were not moving, he knew he had a good chance of seeing the sun set the next day.
He stopped above the first sleeping form and studied where the man’s weapons were. Luckily, he was not lying on them. Squatting down to keep his balance centered over his hips, Yellow Eyes laid hands on the weapons, first the lance and then the bow in its case and the quiver full of arrows. He left the war club and knife, since they were bundled under the man’s head.
His luck held and he was able to silently lift the second man’s lance and bow and arrows. He paused to tie everything into a tight bundle, which he carefully slung across his back. It was not until after he had taken the weapons from the third man that trouble reared its head. The second man moved. He rolled over noisily and pulled his robe up over his shoulders. Then he propped himself on an elbow and stared off into the darkness.
Yellow Eyes stayed absolutely motionless, holding his breath, waiting for the man to realize that his weapons were gone. But after a moment, the man lay back down, and the camp was quiet once more. Though in an awkward kneeling position, Yellow Eyes stayed motionless until he heard the man’s even sleeping breaths. After another long while, he moved into a more comfortable position and waited some more. He had three sets of weapons and debated if it was wise to push his luck. Dawn was still a long way off and there was time, but he had been incredibly lucky up to this point. Still, he did want that fourth set.
When the Three Sisters were close to the black outline of the southern horizon, Yellow Eyes had the last bow, quiver, and lance in hand. Now he was starting his withdrawal, reminding himself that any impatience or carelessness now would undo his deed. Once again moving so slowly that he did not seem to be moving at all, he made his way out of the strangers’ camp.
By the time dawn broke Yellow Eyes was safely in a thicket, having hidden himself and his booty. From his hiding place he had a good view of the strangers. The first man who awoke was in the middle of making a fire when he seemed to notice that something was wrong. He quickly woke the others, and soon they were all on their feet and searching around the fire pit. Yellow Eyes knew they were looking for their weapons.
He knew the strangers had to be perplexed, and he assumed they were angry as well. They conducted another wider and more thorough search around the camp, but of course they found nothing. Their next action showed that the strangers were intelligent, if nothing else, other than heavy sleepers. They departed, heading north, away from the village.
Yellow Eyes followed them for part of the morning, but the strangers did not turn aside from the direction they were taking. When they disappeared over a distant hill, he turned his footsteps home. Near where the strangers had camped he met Elk Knife and a group of warriors. He showed them the deserted camp with the cold ashes in the fire pit.
“Where are they?” asked Fast Dog, the war leader.
“They went away,” replied Yellow Eyes. “Just after dawn.” The strangers’ footprints were plain to see, validating what Yellow Eyes said.
“Why?” asked Elk Knife.
Yellow Eyes shrugged. “Perhaps because I took their weapons.”
The men exchanged puzzled glances, not certain they could believe the young warrior. Without a backward glance Yellow Knife hurried to the thicket where he had hidden the cache of weapons and took them back to the warriors.
Fast Dog examined the weapons closely. “These are the weapons of a people from the north,” he said. He pointed to markings on one of the lances. “I have seen this before. They live along the Big River in large earthen lodges.” He turned to Yellow Eyes. “How did you do this?”
“I sneaked in and took them. They are heavy sleepers,” he explained.
Good-natured laughter flowed through the knot of warriors, but there were also nods and glances acknowledging respect for an extremely brave deed.
The elders awarded the captured weapons to Yellow Eyes. He kept one set and gave away the others to his father and grandfathers. Before the next new moon he was invited to join the Wolf Men Society. It was a small warrior society, its members known for their scouting prowess. They were the eyes and ears of the other warriors, often venturing alone deep into enemy territory. Yellow Eyes accepted the honor. The Wolf Men made a feast and presented their newest member to the village and gave him the symbol of his new status—a wolf-hide cape to be worn over the head and shoulders. As everyone knew, wolves were known for their keen senses, persistence, and patience.
Three more winters passed and Yellow Eyes courted and won the love of a beautiful young woman, and in the ensuing years they raised a daughter and a son. Throughout the prime of his life Yellow Eyes was never the strongest or the fastest warrior, but no one was a better scout and few could match his skill with the bow and arrow.
In time he became a teacher and young men were influenced by his calm and deliberate approach to all things. Now and then a young man would ask Yellow Eyes how he had learned to be such a formidable warrior and scout. To such questions he always had the same answer.
“Let me tell you about grasshoppers.”
Wacintanka
(wah-chin-tan-kah)
Patience
LOOKING AT MOCCASINS
A pair of moccasins sits on a table in our living room and sometimes in my office. They were to have been my father’s, but after he died they were given to me. They are a colorful pair, with red, white, dark blue, and medium blue beads in classic Lakota geometric patterns.
Traditional moccasins like these are still made by Lakota artisans. The basic components are brain-tanned leather, glass beads, thread, and rawhide. Soft-tanned leather forms the top of the moccasin and rawhide the sole. Yet there is another component that cannot be seen, but it is every bit as critical to the construction of the moccasin—patience.
On the pair I have, there are three bands of small beads that circle the moccasin from the toe to the heel and back to the toe. The second band is not quite as long as the first and consequently the third not as long as the second. In each of these bands are vertical rows of 8 beads, with 13 rows to the inch, or 104 beads per inch. Given that the three bands of beads put together are about 68 inches in length, there are approximately 7,072 beads.
On the upper part of the moccasin, from the toe to the instep, are nine bands. Once again each band is eight beads across, and there are ten bands, tapering to a point near the toe to fit into the curve above the first three bands of beads. Combined, the nine bands are approximately 28 inches long. With 104 beads to an inch, there are about 2,912 beads. This means that on each moccasin there are nearly 10,000 beads, and nearly 20,000 on the pair.
The task of making moccasins is simple but time consuming. A pattern is lightly drawn on the hide, then cut. Before the upper and sole are sewn together, the beads are sewn on. After holes are punched in the soft-tanned hide with a sharp awl, the artisan places eight beads, one at a time on a needle, threading it through the hole in the center of each bead. Each line of eight beads is then sewn directly onto the tanned hide through the punched holes. This is known as appliqué beading.
Each artisan who does this kind of craft works at her own pace, so it is difficult to say how long each moccasin takes to bead as a rule. Suffice it to say it is anywhere from 24 to 48 hours of beading. Or each pair of fully beaded moccasins represents 48 to 96 hours of effort. Furthermore, not only is it stringing and sewing on beads row by row, it is also necessary to incorporate the different colored patterns, so a row of eight beads may contain several different colors. It is difficult to say which is more important in the process—skill or patience—but good work cannot be done without both. Without patience, even consummate skill will not realize its full potential.
Patience has applications far beyond making cultural artifacts. Patient people are much less apt to make snap judgments or act impulsively, and they rarely stick their feet in their mouths. They will likely move over and let an impatient driver pass, understanding that getting there is more important than getting there first. Furthermore, patience is a precursor to thoroughness, deliberation, and coolness under pressure. Yet it seems in these times to be ever more rare.
We have become cultures and societies that rely on instant gratification. Like speed-dialing on our phones, as we saw in the last chapter, effect follows cause in less than the blink of an eye. Our technology-dependent existence has taught us that having to wait for anything is an annoyance. Consequently, patience is no longer the necessary virtue it once was. A mere 60 years ago—at least in my world—it was critical.
I watched both of my grandmothers do beadwork. My paternal grandmother beaded traditional moccasins, and my maternal grandmother beaded prayer book covers and once a stole for my uncle, her son, the priest. It seemed to me, as an impatient boy, that they were maddeningly slow. Poke two holes with an awl in the soft-tanned leather, pull a single strand of thread through one hole, pick the beads with the point of a needle, slide them up the thread, push the needle through the second hole, tighten down the thread and set the beads in place, and then inspect that one row of beads. Then repeat the process several hundred, if not several thousand, times. But somehow hours, or sometimes days, later, the piece of hide was covered with beads in intricate multicolored designs and patterns.
My grandfathers showed patience as well. My maternal grandfather walked behind a single-bottom, horse-drawn plow for hours, turning the black prairie loam into furrows. The next day he hooked up the harrow to break down the windrows of dirt. After that he marked out rows so that seeds could be planted. That was only the beginning. After the seeds were planted, I lost track of the days before the first light-green shoots pushed up out of the earth.
My paternal grandfather was an avid fisherman. He was constantly arranging and rearranging his gear in the various compartments in his tackle boxes: lures, hooks, lead weights (sinkers), bobbers, string, and leaders. He would sit for hours, sometimes barely moving, on the shores of a dam, a lake, or the Missouri River, waiting for that tug on his line. Then there were the hours he sat writing his sermon for Sunday service, since he was an ordained Episcopalian deacon. There were times when his pencil remained poised for long, long minutes before he wrote his thoughts on the paper.
I know that my grandparents were not born patient. I know they showed impatience when they were children, as I did, because they told stories on themselves. They learned about patience from their own parents and grandparents. My grandparents and their generation were at most the second to be born on the reservation, and their lives were still tied to the cycles of nature; enough firewood had to be gathered and laid in to last through the winter, for example. In order to do that and everything else that ensured survival and enabled comfort, patience was a necessary virtue.
Their parents and grandparents taught them, and they in turn taught me, what kinds of twigs made the best kindling for starting fires and how to look for just the right kind in thickets in the gullies and in the trees along the creeks and the river. This was always a task requiring several days, resulting in piles of twigs that we then carried to the wagon or came back to pick up later. If I was in a hurry to finish and picked up a branch that was too large, it was relegated to a different pile. After kindling came larger sticks and branches that would be cut to lengths of about 12 to 18 inches to fit into the stoves. After that it was log-size dry wood, six inches thick and wider, that would be split.
In order to be warm and cook food and boil water, certain tasks had to be done, and in a certain order. In following that process I learned the meaning of patience. I knew that the food we cooked, the water we boiled, and the warmth of the heating stove through the long winter nights were just as much a consequence of patience as they were of good, dry wood. I am reminded of that each and every time I use the fireplace in our home.
Before the Industrial Age, people lived in closer association with the natural cycles and whims of nature. Events in nature occurred (and still do) when conditions are favorable or reach a certain point, regardless of any calendar; our ancestors could not affect that process, so in order to go along with nature’s program, patience was a necessary virtue. Impatience, however, has always been a human trait, and at some point it evolved into a defining factor in human societies. My grandfather theorized that mankind learned the arrogance of impatience when the clock was invented.
In the old days, my ancestors would say something like, Wicokan isamya kin iwahunni ktelo, or “I will arrive after the sun is in the middle” (meaning noon). Therefore there was no reason for those waiting to get impatient or worry until the sun went down. Though our language identified sunrise, dawn, morning, noon, afternoon, sunset, evening, dusk, and night, those words were not measurements of time, but simply identifiers of the various stages of the day and night. In and of themselves, those words and those realities did not foster impatience.
I agree with my grandfather’s theory. I can see the approaching dawn and then the sunrise, and I can discern when the sun is “in the middle” of the sky, as well as when it goes down and when darkness comes. I can experience those realities. Never in my life, however, have I actually seen an hour in the same way. An hour is not real; it is an artificial measurement of something we do not fully understand. Something that does foster impatience. Without the artificial concept of time or clocks and watches to measure it, we would not be able to say, “I’ll see you in fifteen minutes.” The best we could say would be “I’ll see you in a little while.”
As it is, though, our modern lifestyles are totally dependent on the artificial measurement of time. Our work days and nights start and end at a certain hour. For some of us, the start of our shift arrives much too quickly and the end of it cannot come quickly enough. Reluctance on one end, impatience on the other. Whatever our emotions and reactions, though, the shift begins, we do our work, and it ends. That happens no matter how reluctant or impatient we are. It might, therefore, be preferable to accept the reality of the situation and patiently let it run its course.
Hours, minutes, seconds, and even nanoseconds are part of our lives—so long as the technology is able to measure “time.” Measuring time sometimes serves a useful purpose. Airlines, railroads, and bus lines, for example, schedule departures and arrivals down to the minute. On a recent trip, my departing flight was 12 minutes late leaving the gate, and the next flight was behind schedule because that plane was delayed nearly 30 minutes by weather. Already impatient to get home, I was agitated by the delays. But my impatience did not change things one bit. The only way to deal with them was to wait patiently. “Whatever else may be, the day will come and the day will end,” my grandparents would say. They also assured me that it would not pass any faster simply because of my impatience.
In the old days, long before the arrival of horses on the northern Great Plains, the people still moved their villages often. It was said they could walk 30 miles in one day. One group on the move descended into a little valley cut by a wide creek and stopped to rest. From the west came a line of buffalo led by an old cow. One by one and two by two they came, paused to drink from the creek, and then moved up the low hills onto the plateau beyond. Since it was early summer, there were many reddish-brown calves in the herd. The people had no choice but to wait for the last of the herd to pass before they continued their journey. One little girl seemed particularly bothered by the delay, so her grandmother came up with a game to help her wait. For every five calves—which happened to coincide with the number of fingers on each hand—the old woman told her granddaughter to place a stone on the ground.
The little girl quickly ran to the creek and gathered a handful of stones. Then for every five calves she put down a stone. Soon she had a long line of stones and had to hurry to the creek several times to gather more. She was so absorbed in counting the calves as the herd passed that she forgot about having to wait. Other children joined the game of counting the calves.
The herd of buffalo was so large that it took until sundown for all of them to pass, so the people camped for the night along the creek. The next morning they departed. The little girl and her friends, of course, left behind a long line of small stones in the meadow along the creek. Thereafter that little valley was known as the Valley of the Calves. It was said that those small stones remained there for many, many years, testimony to a grandmother’s inventiveness that served as a lesson in patience.
Winter was the greatest test of my patience as a boy, especially in those carefree years before I went away to school. That season on the northern plains was harsh no matter what. On one end of the scale was tolerable, on the other was just plain brutal. Whatever it was, I dreaded it. But something changed the winter I was approaching my sixth year. Perhaps I simply gained a keener awareness, because the stories my grandparents told me meant more than they had before.
When they sensed my impatience and apprehension, especially after the sun went down—because winter nights were longer—one of them would ask me, “Did I ever tell you about the time Iktomi tried to fly?” Whether I answered yes or no did not matter. The question was asked to let me know it was time for a story.
The story itself was important, of course. But there was more to it than Iktomi’s misadventures and how he learned the value of truth or faith, or whatever moral the story espoused. Sometimes the stories were about ancestors, or an event in the past, or a place. But whatever they were, they were always delivered in the same quietly loving and patient manner. That winter was the first time I heard the story of how grasshoppers taught many things to young boys.
One story frequently led to another, and before I knew it the evening had passed and it was time for sleep. All but forgotten were the dark, cold, snow, and howling wind outside. And it was not only stories, but things to do that seemed to shorten the long winter evenings. My grandmother would ask me to string beads for her. Yellow beads on one thread, red on another, and so on. My grandfather taught me how to whittle thin strips of wood from a long, dry branch, in effect making kindling to start fires. Or he had me arrange the wood bin so the wood was in neat stacks.
Interestingly, my grandparents never actually said, “You must be patient.” They simply showed me with their own actions and demeanor. They spoke quietly, they faced situations calmly, and went unhurriedly about to do what had to be done. As a child I somehow (and fortunately) knew that it was good to imitate them, and as I grew older I understood more and more that the winter evenings did pass. How they passed—quickly, enjoyably, or with difficulty—depended on the manner in which I chose to deal with the moment. Therefore, at some point I chose consciously to emulate my grandparents and exercise patience, even in the most difficult of circumstances.
Light-speed technology will be around for a while, seducing us into believing that everything has to happen fast. For example, there will always be those drivers whose cars creep forward at the intersection, indignantly waiting for the light to turn green so they can hurry to the next intersection and stress themselves out waiting again. There is one essential bit of knowledge every driver has: at some point the light will turn green. No amount of impatience or indignation will make it turn faster. Simple common sense should tell us that there is far less stress in just waiting patiently. As all of my grandparents would say about any situation, “It is what it is.” And while it is better to download a photograph in seconds with broadband than to wait five minutes with dial-up Internet, there are instances when slower is good.
There is a line from a popular movie, a Western, that says something like this: You find a thousand ways of running down your time. The reference is to our lives, the time we each have on this earth. Halfway into my seventh decade I have certainly reached that point in my life when things seem to happen fast. As a matter of fact, much too fast. Grandchildren are born and suddenly, it seems, they are already five or seven years old. A few years ago it dawned on me that I have lived most of my life—most of my time has run down, as it were. If there were some way to slow it down now, I would do that. But, of course, the days, the seasons, and the years will pass as they always have. Therefore it is up to me to savor each good moment and endure the difficult ones in the same way—with patience.
I am reminded of that each time I look at those moccasins sitting on a table.