Tilly and the Crazy Eights

by Monique Gray Smith

  Tilly helped Lucy to her feet and continued to hold her hand.

  When everyone was standing and the noise had died down, the emcee looked to the gentleman and his hand drum. “Take it away.”

  The eagle sat perched on his companion’s gloved hand and they slowly made their way around the arena. At the end of each round of song, the companion would stop and remove the eagle’s mask and the eagle would spread and flap its wings. As this happened, the emcee would announce, “Fill yourself with the blessings.” The eagle would flap its wings a few more times and then tip its head for his companion to put the mask on, and they’d move to the next door. This happened at the doors of the arena that represented the four directions.

  When they stopped in front of the section where Tilly and the elders were standing, Tilly closed her eyes and opened her arms. It was like the emcee was talking to her, “Fill yourself with the blessings.” She could feel the eagle medicine fill her, bless her. She could also feel Lucy’s hand in hers and with each flap of those wings, Lucy’s hand got warmer and warmer.

  When Tilly no longer felt the wind coming off the eagle’s wings, with her eyes still closed, she offered only one word. Kinânskomitin.

  After a few moments, she opened her watery eyes and looked down at Lucy. Lucy was using her free hand to wipe away the tears streaming down her face.

  “Can’t believe I’m being a big ol’ crybaby again, but geez Tilly, I ain’t never experienced anythin’ like that before. I ain’t never felt this proud to be Indian.”

  Tilly looked down the row at the elders. Her aunties and uncles. Bea had removed her glasses and was using her shirtsleeve to dry her eyes. Chuck stood with his chest out, head back, eyes closed, and his body moved up and down to the beat of the drum. Poncho stood with his cowboy hat held to his heart and his eyes were almost closed because of the huge smile on his face. Rose stood with her purse over the crook of one arm and the other holding Poncho’s free hand. Tilly couldn’t tell for sure, but she thought she saw the pride welling up in Rose’s eyes. Mabel stood with both hands on her heart and her mouth moving. Tilly knew the words she couldn’t hear made up a beautiful prayer.

  On the other side of Lucy stood Annie. She was looking toward the arena entrance where Sarah would soon emerge. Her camera hung around her neck and she had her phone in her hand. There was no way she was going to miss capturing Sarah dancing. No way!

  Tilly’d never loved anyone quite the way she loved each and every one of these Crazy Eights!

  The thunderous beat of the Pow Wow drum was like an explosion, the sound reverberating throughout the arena. Three more beats and then the high-pitched voices of the singers joined in. A chill went down Tilly’s spine, and her throat tightened. She felt her shoulders push back and her body become more erect. As she glanced one more time at the elders; they, too, seemed taller.

  Something stirred deep within her. Something awakened. A strength that was not only hers, but belonged to those who had gone before her and whose blood ran through her.

  The emcee came back on and spread out his words, enunciating loudly, “Oh, do it boys! Do it! Do it!” He made each word linger in the air. “It’s Pow Wow time and I’m Pow Wow happy!”

  Lucy’s face radiated joy as she turned to Tilly. “I’m Pow Wow happy.” Tilly giggled and wiped her eyes.

  “Aw, now look who’s all sappy,” yelled Lucy over the drumming and singing.

  “I know, I know. What can I say? Grand Entry always makes me cry.”

  The MC continued. “Ladies and Gentlemen, if you like the singing and dancing, how about a round of applause?” The crowd erupted. Hundreds and hundreds of dancers were making their way onto the arena floor, turning it into a radiant sea of colors moving in time to the drum. The emcee came over the loud speaker again, “Oh what a sight, the pride of the Indian Nations, representing Turtle Island. Over five hundred and sixty tribes in the United States and over two hundred Canadian Indian bands are right here at the Gathering of Nations Pow Wow.”

  At that moment, Chuck leaned over to Bea. “If only Duncan Campbell Scott could see us now.” Bea laughed so hard her head fell back. Chuck was referring to one of the many men in Canadian politics and history who had systematically attempted to eradicate the First Peoples and their culture and language.

  “Yeah, looks like his policies really worked to take the Indian out of the Indian, eh?” Bea replied sarcastically, and they both laughed. It felt good, real good to know that history did not determine the future. They did.

  Chuck took in the spectacle of twenty thousand people of different ages and races who had gathered to celebrate. He leaned and talked loud enough so Bea could hear him over the drumming. “I know that I haven’t been a proponent of reconciliation. Thought it was just another government way of making money off of us, and for Canadians to feel better about history.”

  Bea nodded. More than once on this trip she had heard his tirade against reconciliation. Not the truth part, just the reconciliation.

  His eyes swept the scene again, and then, with his hand, he motioned to what was unfolding before them. “When this many people, from all different kinds of backgrounds come together to celebrate and uphold the dignity of our culture and ceremonies, well, this to me is part of what reconciliation is about.”

  “Yes, my love! It sure is.” With every thunderous whisk of the drumsticks on the drum, Bea’s knees bounced.

  Tilly looked down the line of elders and noticed Bea dancing. She couldn’t help but think how much Bea had changed since the beginning of the trip. She seemed younger. Her eyes had a spark, and it was almost as if she glowed.

  Just then, Mabel pointed and yelled out to the group, “There she is! There’s Sarah!”

  Sarah entered the arena floor, and as soon as her feet hit the floor she began to dip and sway to the beat of the drum. She held her eagle fan high, moving it forward and back, almost like she was cleaning the air of anything that might be hurtful.

  Annie wasn’t prepared for the emotions that welled up in her. For the first time she could remember, maybe for the first time ever, Annie felt proud to be Native.

  They all realized how powerful this moment was. Witnessing the remarkable courage and strength of Sarah—after all she had been through over the last few months—to be dancing at the Gathering of Nations Pow Wow was beyond extraordinary.

  Grand Entry lasted for almost an hour. Sarah danced the entire time. Each beat of the drum lifted her spirit. She couldn’t believe the energy she felt. How vibrant she felt. How beautiful she felt. How alive she felt.

  48

  All Good Things in Their Rightful Time

  TILLY WAS NESTLED on the bleacher between Poncho and Bea when the time finally came for Sarah’s category, the Golden Age Women, to dance. The drum group was called and the first four beats of the song were loud. The voices matched them, stirring a genetic memory within Tilly. The memory of someone who came before her and whose blood ran through her. Ancestral memory.

  Rose stood. Poncho followed his wife’s lead, and then, one by one, all the elders and Tilly rose to show their respect for Sarah and the other dancers.

  Tilly watched as Sarah moved clockwise around the arbor, her feet barely coming off the floor, her knees bending with each beat of the drum. She stood tall, her shoulders back, and her head held high. In her right hand, she held her eagle fan while her left arm crossed her chest with the Pendleton blanket draped over it. Her grace and beauty were stunning.

  After the song ended and everyone had sat down, Bea turned to Tilly. “I always get choked up watching the elders dance the Women’s Traditional.” She looked back out to the dance floor, but continued talking. “The tender and graceful way they dance each and every step, in unison with the drum, reminding us how we are to be walking our lives here on Earth. Gently. You know what it makes me think of, Tilly?”

  Tilly shook her
head from side to side. She knew that Bea was about to share a gift with her. She waited, knowing Bea would continue talking when she was ready.

  “Makes me think of the different layers of our teachings.” With her eyes forward, watching as the dancers prepared for the next song, Bea began. “Many think humility is about not being full of yourself—about thinking of others—but there’s more to humility than that. It’s also about having faith that all good things will unfold in their rightful time.” Bea went on to share with Tilly that in this busy world, we push, push, push to make things happen. She told her it is our ego that tries to make something happen, usually so that we feel better in some way. “We need to get back to the old ways, of a balance between working hard to make things happen and having faith that if something is in our greatest good, it will unfold.” She turned to look at Tilly. “I’ve come to learn that when I don’t get what I want or think I need, I’m being protected. Time always reveals why I didn’t get what I wanted. It’s one of the ways the Creator and our Ancestors take care of us.”

  Tilly remained still, letting Bea’s teaching settle in. She looked from Bea out to the dance floor and back to Bea. She put her arm around Bea, leaned over, and kissed her cheek. “Kisâhkihitin, Bea.”

  Bea patted Tilly’s knee. “I love you too, Tilly.”

  Tilly had so much to thank Bea for. She had pretty much been a pillar in Tilly’s life since the first day they met at the Friendship Centre in Kamloops. Bea had been integral to Tilly’s recovery from alcoholism. She’d help guide Tilly’s reconnection to her culture, she’d been her witness when Tilly married Mick, and so much more. “Thank you for everything, Bea.”

  Bea’s eyes radiated the love she felt for Tilly. “Just remember, my girl. All good things in their rightful time.”

  49

  Full Up on Love

  SARAH SAT ON the edge of the bed and glanced at the clock. “Oh, my gracious.”

  “What?” asked Annie as she came out of the washroom and navigated the dimly lit hotel room toward her bed.

  “It’s one in the morning,” replied Sarah.

  “Noooo.”

  “It is!”

  “Well, I’ll be…” Annie’s voice trailed off.

  “You’ll be what?” asked Sarah as she slid her watch over her hand and placed it on the nightstand, then slipped her feet out of her slippers and swung her legs up onto the bed.

  Annie looked across at her sister, who was now snuggled beneath the covers. “I don’t know what I’ll be. What is that saying that the old people have, ‘something like being knee-high to a grasshopper.’”

  “Annie, those are things white people say. I mean really, no grasshopper hung around long enough for me to get knee-high to it.”

  “Yeah.” Annie giggled. “I guess you’re right.”

  “You know how the ol’ people say every race got its own gifts?” asked Sarah.

  “Mm,” murmured Annie.

  “Well, maybe that’s one of the white people’s gifts. Maybe they can get that close to grasshoppers cuz they’re grasshopper whisperers.”

  The sisters cracked up laughing.

  When Sarah had caught her breath, she added, “Yeah, that’s a gift to be real proud of, eh? Go introducing yourself and be all, like, ‘Hi, I’m Sarah and I’m a grasshopper whisperer.’”

  Again, their laughter filled the room.

  Sarah sat up in bed. “All this laughin’ has me havin’ to go pee again.” Upon returning and crawling beneath the covers, Sarah commented, “Don’t know the last time I was up this late.”

  Annie reached up and turned the light off. As darkness filled the room, Sarah released a deep sigh. She closed her eyes and her mind wove its way back to Grand Entry. She wanted to replay it again and again. To make sure every single step, every drumbeat, every motion of her eagle fan was etched in her memory forever.

  “I can die now,” she whispered.

  “What? Sarah! Don’t talk like that!” Annie snapped. She didn’t know how else to respond. Perhaps being empathic or something gentler might have been a better response, but hearing her sister talk about death…well, with everything that had happened this year, it was too much for Annie, and all she could do was scold her big sister.

  Sarah rolled on her side to face her sister, whom she could see by the light from the parking lot that streamed through their curtains. “It’s true, Annie. I was just thinkin’ how today was one o’ the best days o’ my life. There ain’t nothin’ else I wanna see. Or do.”

  “Oh, come on, Sarah, sure there is!” Annie reacted.

  “Nope. Nope there isn’t. I came on this trip with a big part o’ me empty.” Even in the shadows of the night, Sarah could see the quizzical look on Annie’s face. “I didn’t realize it, but tonight, out there dancin’, I felt alive. More alive than I have in a real long time. I never in my wildest dreams ever thought I’d dance again, let alone here at the World Pow Wow. It’s pretty crazy!” She wasn’t sure if she should tell Annie about being able to see the Ancestors dancing with her tonight, or about the young woman who kept visiting her. She wasn’t sure Annie would understand. But she’d kept too many secrets from her sister and it had only driven a wedge between them. “I danced tonight with our Ancestors.” Sarah paused for a moment. Hearing the words made the experience even more real. “Maybe you couldn’t see them, but I could.” She filled her lungs and slowly released the air. “They were there, Annie.”

  Silence.

  And then, in a much softer tone than previously, “I believe you, Sarah.”

  Sarah closed her eyes and as sleep beckoned her, she said through a smile, “You see now why I feel like there’s nothin’ left to see or do? I done it all, Annie. I danced at the World Pow Wow an’ now I’m full up on love.”

  50

  Beading Hall of Fame

  IT WAS SATURDAY afternoon and Lucy, Rose, and Tilly were ready for a little Pow Wow shopping. They made their way over to the vendor building and when they entered, their eyes widened as they took in the scene. There were over four hundred stalls. Mostly artisans selling items like stuffed animals made out of Pendleton blankets, beaded items, buckskin clothing, regalia, dreamcatchers, soaps and candles with scents like sage, cedar, and sweetgrass, clothing with sayings, or artwork related to Pow Wow or being Indigenous, toys, books, and of course, jewelry. You name it and you could probably find it somewhere in the vendor building.

  “Where do we start?” asked Lucy.

  Neither Rose nor Tilly responded; they were still processing the magnitude of what lay before them. Lucy took a step closer to them, partially to get out of the way of the traffic walking in and out, but also because she wasn’t sure they’d heard her. She asked again, “Where do we start?”

  This time, Tilly and Rose both raised their shoulders, indicating “I don’t know.”

  They had to shuffle out of the way of people again, and it was then that Lucy gave directions. “Let’s head this way,” she said and pointed to her left. “We’ll go clockwise around. That way if we get lost, it should be easy to find each other.” Lucy didn’t wait for the two women to respond, she headed in that direction, and just as Lucy had predicted, it wasn’t long before the elders got separated from Tilly.

  Rose and Lucy spent lengthy periods examining the intricacy and detail of the beadwork available for sale. At one table, Lucy picked up a hairclip and admired the way the artist had been able to create such beauty. She groaned out loud as she placed the hairclip back on the table and mumbled, “I ain’t never gonna be able to bead anythin’ like that again.” Lucy looked up to see if Rose was listening to her and said, “’Member that butterfly sequence I did?”

  Rose replied, “How could I forget?”

  “Mm-hmm. That girl won competitions, first place for years.”

  “Yeah. It wasn’t that girl’s dancin’ that helped her wi
n. It was your amazing beadwork,” said Rose. “And cuz you put a prayer in every bead.” Rose knew the depth of Lucy’s loss when she could no longer do one of the things she most loved in the world. Beading.

  Lucy had been a bit of a legend back in the day, back before the arthritis took home in her hands. Her beading had helped save Lucy when Jenny went missing…and when she never came home.

  Rose looked down at her friend’s face, it was clouded with sadness. Rose reached out and squeezed Lucy’s forearm. “Aw, Lucy. I remember how when you were working on that piece, how you used to hush us. Tell us you were doing sacred work. You’d tell us to behave and speak words that were like medicine.”

  “Yeah. Well, time changes everything,” Lucy solemnly replied.

  Rose put the moccasin she’d been admiring back on the table and turned to her best friend. “Ain’t that the truth.” She gave Lucy a wink. “I still think your work should be in the Beading Hall of Fame.”

  “Beading Hall of Fame? Is there even such a place?” asked Lucy.

  “How should I know? But if there is, it ain’t complete without Lucy Louie’s beadwork!”

  Lucy regarded her friend for a moment. “After all these years of being friends, Rose, I think that’s the nicest thing you ever said to me.” She reached over and put her hand on Rose’s arm. “Thank you.”

  “Aw, don’t go getting all mushy-gushy on me, Lucy. It’s the truth, that’s all.” Rose pulled her arm away and glanced back to the table.

  “And there she is—the Rose I know and love,” Lucy said. They turned to face each other, smiled, and bumped shoulders playfully.

  51

  A Visit from Grandma Tilly

  TILLY AND THE Crazy Eights spent all Saturday afternoon and evening hanging out at the Pow Wow. Tilly was mesmerized by the drumbeat and loved how the voices of the men carried with them a current of energy that caused her to bounce in unison with the rhythm. She was sitting side by side with Mabel on a plastic bench in the arena, watching the Men’s Chicken Dance competition. Both were transfixed by the dancers and lost in their own world until the drumming came to an end. When the clapping finally quieted down, Mabel noticed Tilly sigh deeply.