Madeline m’s Reviews > Neither Wolf nor Dog: On Forgotten Roads with an Indian Elder > Status Update

“When something is sacred, it does not have a price. I don’t care if it is white people talking about heaven or Indian people talking about ceremonies. If you can buy it, it isn’t sacred and once you start to sell it, it doesn’t matter whether your reasons are good or not. You are taking what is sacred and making it ordinary.”

“It all comes back to possessions. You want to have everything and you think that is fine, as long as it is put in piles or in rooms or in boxes with labels. We don’t have very much and we leave it when we don’t want it or need it.”

“All you really care about is keeping things clean. You don’t care how they really are, just so long as they are clean. You see a dirt path with a pop can next to it and you think that is worse than a big paved highway that is kept clean. You get madder at a forest with a trash bag in it than at a big shopping center that is all clean and swept.”

“Generosity is the most important. Now we have been turned around. We think that good people should be rewarded, just like the white man thinks. Can’t you see how much better it was when good people thought they should give, not that they should get? We didn’t measure people by rich and poor. We didn’t know how. When times were good, everyone was rich. When times were bad, everyone was poor.”

“We did not think we owned the land. The land was part of us. We didn’t even know about owning the land, it is like talking about owning your grandmother. You can’t own your grandmother! She just is your grandmother, why would you talk about owning her?”

“That’s the trouble. Our whole people were ruined by your whole people, but there are good people in the middle. There always have been. We used to help settlers, they would help us. We thought we could all live together, but we were so different. When I make a promise, I see my grandfathers looking over my shoulder. If I break my word, I disgrace them. How could I do that?”

“If you hate your own people, you can’t be a very good person. You have to love your own people, even if you hate what they do.”

“There are echoes beneath your feet that are there to be heard, if you are willing to still your mind and listen to your heart.”