Looking for Love

Taken from the chapter “Looking for Love” in the book Keepers of the Faith: Five Native Women Share Their Stories

by Debra Fieguth.

Canada’s Arctic can seem cold and desolate to people who make their home in the South, but to those whose way of life is rooted in the tundra and snow, it’s warm, familiar and secure.

On May 28, 1954, Lizzie Epoo was born into an Inuit family on Patterson Island. It was nearing summer, and since the family was nomadic, Lizzie was born in a tent. She was the second daughter born to Lazarusie and Amilia (Emily) Epoo, but since another family had adopted her older sister, she was the eldest to grow up in the Epoo household. Three brothers and a sister followed.

When Lizzie was only six months old, her mother became sick with tuberculosis and had to go south for medical care. She spent years in the hospital, both in Hamilton, Ontario, and in Moose Factory. Both places were thousands of miles away from home, too far to visit, so Lizzie’s grandmother Anna became the maternal figure in her life. Anna’s home would often be filled with friends praying and studying the Bible in Inuktitut.

Lizzie formed a close bond with Grandmother Anna, who was a very gentle, loving woman. Whenever Lizzie saw Anna, she would run and give her grandmother a big hug. Her grandmother made her feel very secure.

Anna was a very godly woman. She loved to read from the Bible and study it, and taught Lizzie the importance of prayer. When Lizzie was still a young child, Anna went blind. She contracted glaucoma and lost her eyesight very quickly. There was no easy access to medical treatment then, the way there is now. When a person in a northern community needs urgent medical attention, a plane is sent in to take the person to a clinic or hospital.

Still Anna prayed asking God to allow her to see her grandchildren once in a while.

And God granted that request. Sometimes in the early mornings, Lizzie recalls, her grandmother would be able to see the children sleeping—one granddaughter in the bed beside her, and Lizzie and her brother at her feet. She would watch them and admire them for several minutes before losing her sight again.

In those days, Arctic children had no notion of manufactured toys or games. They played outside in the snow and on the rocks, using their imagination to transform rocks into dolls. Nature was a friend: kids would jump on the huge pieces of ice floating on the sea in summer, or play tag on the tundra or snow.

In the winter the family would build an igloo, keeping it cosy with a fire and heating it with an oil lamp. It was a comfortable place to live.

Lizzie’s father did the family hunting and fishing, fetching seal, bearded seal, caribou, and varieties of fish like cod, char, and trout. Lizzie’s favorite food was caribou, but she liked other kinds of meat, too, cooked, raw or frozen.

When Lizzie was old enough to go to school, the Epoo family shed the nomadic lifestyle and moved into a house in a community. Lizzie wasn’t too happy about that. The house was so dry, and at first she couldn’t sleep. There seemed to be no air, unlike the igloo she was used to, which had just the right humidity.

School also changed Lizzie’s life. She had to speak English, and learn certain manners which seemed foreign to her. In Inuit culture, for example, people don’t use any word for “please” because it sounds too much like begging. Instead, they would gesture, or use a particular tone of voice to indicate they wanted something.

The school seemed strict, and too full of rules. Nevertheless, Lizzie liked to learn, and even when she came home from school her father would teach her reading and spelling in both the Roman alphabet used in English and the syllabics used for Inuktitut.

Lizzie’s parents didn’t want her to go away to school, and because there was no advanced schooling in their community, she quit after Grade six, when she was thirteen years old. She quickly got a job at the same school as an interpreter for the kindergarten children, as well as a teaching assistant. Later she went to the Hudson’s Bay Company, the main—and usually, the only—retail store in the North, where she worked as a clerk.

No matter what kind of job she had, Lizzie made sure she had time to read and study. She loved learning.

Early one morning when Lizzie was thirteen her mother woke her up to tell her the sad news: her grandmother had died during the night of heart failure. Lizzie was heartbroken. She loved her grandmother so much, more than anyone in the world.

“Can I see her?” Lizzie asked. “Can I say goodbye?”

The answer was no. The women of the community were already washing Grandmother Anna and preparing her for burial. They wouldn’t let the young girl say her last goodbye.

Lizzie was angry and hurt. And she made a decision. “I decided never to love anyone again because it hurt too much.”

Keepers of the Faith: Five Native Women Share Their Stories by Debra Fieguth.

This book is available from Indian Life and can be purchased for a limited time for only $8.97 (originally $14.95). You can use the order form on page 19 or call 1-800-665-9275 to order. Special price good only until July 1, 2013.

Building Identity with Family Traditions

by Jim Minor

For hundreds of years, September has been the month for wild rice around the western end of Lake Superior. Wild rice is a tall, slender plant of the grass family, which grows in shallow bays of inland lakes. The heads ripen in early-to-mid-September and are now considered a gourmet food in North America.

Aboriginal people of the area commonly called wild rice manomin. One tribe, who now live in northern Wisconsin, were known by the surrounding tribes as Menominee because they depended so much on the wild rice as a food source.

The harvesting of wild rice was a major event for Ojibwe, Menominee and Chippewa people. Traditionally a husband and wife team did the harvesting. The man paddled the canoe while the woman bent the seed-laden heads over the canoe and whacked them with a stick in order to get the seeds to fall into the canoe. When the canoe was full of rice they would empty it and go back for more.

The rice was dried by placing it on mats of sticks and grass, which were suspended over a smoky fire. When the rice was dry it was put into skin bags and placed in a hole in the ground, where the men trampled it in rhythm to the beat of a drum. Then the rice was winnowed to remove the dust and chaff.

The rice was usually served boiled with meat drippings. A tastier dish was sometimes made of blueberries, wild rice, boiled duck and maple syrup.

At the end of the harvest the people gathered for a great feast. It was a time of rejoicing and dancing. Wild rice was considered a gift of the spirits, and the people wanted to give thanks for the bounty.

We also set aside a day on our calendar as a day of Thanksgiving. We are thankful to the Creator for the bounty of harvest. The God who supplies our physical needs has also enriched our lives with the presence of His Spirit through Jesus Christ. When Paul, the great missionary apostle, considered this theme, he wrote,

Now He who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will also supply and increase your store of seed and will enlarge the harvest of your righteousness. Thanks be to God for His indescribable gift” (Second Corinthians 9:10,15).

Taken from the book Growing as a Father: Faces of Fatherhood by J. David Hertzler. You can get this book from Indian Life at a special price of only $6.00 (originally $12.95) for a limited time. Use the order form on page 19 or call 1-800-665-9275 to order with credit card. Special price good only until July 1, 2013.