Excerpts from The Chief and I:

October 3, 2002 Sorrow and joy

Today, Little Eagle asked how I was, and I said, "Sad." We hugged. He was so tired. "They sell the river for the dollar." He said he spoke with them some years ago and told them "it was the last clean river here, and they destroy it-God's world- but they do not listen. They talk in 'we.' I am a man and must endure what other men are doing." The weight of that statement is a heavy stone to carry in this life.

When he woke from his nap, he had the purest expression on his face and said, "I've been thinking we need to make a sign and paint 'It's a beautiful, sunny day,' on it and set it as you come into the reservation, so people might stop and see it and take notice of the beauty. People are so busy; they go all around, but they don't notice the beauty."

This is the world today, full of sorrow, the reservoir battle, probable war. But I have my gifts from the Chief. Here we sit, the two of us in a small corner of the world, and there is so much life here, so much love.

November 22, 2002 “I went home and bloomed.”

One day Web and I were talking about the yearly tribute when the Chief presents an offering of wild game to the governor of Virginia as part of the 1677 treaty, and he said, “I went to the tribute, and they commented on my advanced age. I think they expected me to go home and fade like a flower, but even though I was old, I was not a flower that faded. I went home and bloomed.”

June 16, 2004 River heart

In the early morning, before my mind has woken up, I make my way to the pier with coffee and look out on the opening day. I stand before the brown water. I dive into the silent, dark world and feel my body surging upward, hair wet and gleaming, skin wet and gleaming, and I smile and begin to move through the silky river. The fish splash. We are together in this riverworld.

Every day I swim and swim as if I am flying off into blueness. I drive to work with river hair and river skin and river heart.