Prairie Grass

by Joan Soggie

  Well. Maybe a more supportive attitude?

  On the three-quarter-hour drive to Regina, I had given him an abbreviated version of my growing understanding of the role of Indian-Metis in the Saskatchewan story. To think that a week ago I had scarcely known what a Metis was. How could I not be intrigued by the possibility of tracing a family’s history from buffalo days into the 21st century?

  But Andy laughed at the thought of what I might find.

  “You don’t know the half of it,” he said. “Jails full of aboriginal gang members, inner city apartment buildings that no one wants to go into because of the drug addicts and drunks – and just talk to farmers who live near a reserve. No respect for private property.”

  “But those problems didn’t just happen, did they,” I countered. “The roots of every society’s problems reach into the past. I think that’s true for individuals, too. I read about a study that showed the trauma an individual endures is passed on genetically to the next generation. Imagine growing up with all the baggage of past centuries weighing you down. To say nothing of the constant prejudice.”

  “Hey, just a cotton-pickin’ minute,” Andy countered, no longer smiling. “Get one thing straight. I. Am. Not. Prejudiced. It is one thing to go around bad-mouthing a whole group of people for no reason …”

  “Which is exactly what you are doing!” I yelled.

  He continued quietly, making the point that whereas I was emotional and unreasonable, he was rational and calm. “It is only sensible to look at the facts and see what the situation really is, right now, today. I know — better than you do, I might add — what their world was like in ancient times. The warfare. The struggle to survive. I am just saying everybody has problems, everybody has to make choices, and I am not going to believe that anyone gets a pass to be a drunk or a thief because of whatever happened to his grandfather.”

  “How can you pretend that the past has no bearing on the present?” I asked heatedly. “I know Dad grew up learning some pretty useful stuff from his family, thanks to his Scots ancestors. And you, maybe you picked up your racial biases from your German heritage!”

  “No chance of that,” he retorted, his coolness matching my heat. “My folks were all good Mennonites who got chased out of the Netherlands and then ended up in Russia, not Germany. Well, maybe they spent a generation or two in Germany. Hundreds of years ago. Before Russia. Then were driven out of Russia by the Communists. We all have hard-luck stories in our family tree.”

  “And so, we should be understanding,” I interrupted.

  “Gabby-girl, I am as kind and understanding as the next one. But you know what I mean. Surely some of your sociology classes covered those statistics? The high rate of addiction on reserves? Incarceration five times the national level? There is a reason for that, Gabby. And a lot of it is personal choice.”

  I had stared at him. Hard.

  He made me feel stupid. And I may be naïve, but I am not stupid.

  Which is why I said nothing more for the rest of the drive into Regina. And why I threw all my energy into the dancing, laughing crowd in the park, reveling in sunshine and music, putting all our personal differences aside.

  By Sunday afternoon I was still mad at him, but decided I needed a little more clarity in my own thinking before getting drawn into another argument. I did not want our differing attitudes to drive us apart. I liked Andy, liked being with him. At college, I deliberately avoided people who made political choices about their friends, or who only associated with people who thought as they do. My childhood as an armed forces brat made me cynical about the benefits of uniformity and conformity. And my inborn curiosity drew me towards the outsider, the unusual, the strange. Maybe Andy would become more open to my point of view as I listened to his.

  As I left Mom and Dad’s home to drive back to Swift Current, I thought about the meetings with Eric Tollerud’s daughters scheduled for the next few days. I would put Indian-Metis history in the vault to mull over later. The present, the here and now, claimed my attention.

  Monday morning, I once more hit the road to Mammoth. Carol and Jo had suggested they meet me at the pioneer home after I’d had an hour or so to chat with their dad. I was relieved they’d readily agreed to help get Eric talking about his middle years. It was only with his daughters that he would reminisce about home life, and then it was mostly just comments or corrections or snorts of laughter, responses to family stories they initiated. The stories he consented to tell always harked back to the land, the farm, the political or agricultural scene.

  This morning was no different. I’d decided to work my way through his history decade by decade, getting at least a cameo appearance of the character, Eric Tollerud, in the saga of the land. Today, I would ask about the war years, the early 1940s. He answered me brusquely at first, saying I should have asked his brother about that, both Derwood and Gerald served in the armed forces during the war. I countered that I wasn’t interested in a war story, just wanted to know what he recalled most vividly about the 1940s.

  He was still speaking in his slow deliberate way when Jo and Carol arrived. They sat quietly listening. Then he said to them, “You won’t remember any of this, you were so young.”

  Both spoke at once. “Of course, I remember!”

  “Uncle Gerald coming home from the war is one of my earliest memories!” Jo chimed in.

  They talked until the attendant came with Eric’s lunch, and talked while Carol served him his soup, and when the nurse came to help Eric to bed for his nap, we left and continued the conversation over chicken salad and tea at the restaurant. And, in spite of himself, Eric remained the central figure in the story I found; but always set, just as he saw himself, in relationship to the land.

  Eric (1945)

  The hills glow tawny in afternoon sunlight, a placid, beneficent presence at the western edge of awareness. The hay rack moves slowly down the dusty trail. Its load sways and shifts gently as metal wheels bump over ruts they have already worn into the stony ground. Placing each broad hoof deliberately, eyes placid but ears alert, the shaggy-maned team plods steadily towards the rows of young ash and poplar growing around the farmyard.

  Two children perched atop the load are sunk waist deep in fragrant hay. The older and taller sits upright, keeping a protective arm around her younger sister curled up beside her. “No fooling around, now,” they’ve been told. So, they sit still, privileged and proud, secure in the safety ensured by obedience. Their father, a tall sunburned man in his thirties, balances on the wooden slats at the front of the hay wagon. The reins lie loose in his capable hands. His face has been weathered by every season, biting frosts and blazing noons and dirt-filled winds, just as his spare frame bears mute witness to continuous physical effort. He wears his surroundings as comfortably as his own skin.

  How many times has he done this? Hundreds of times, maybe thousands? Cut the hay, move on to the next field while that one dries, return days later with the hayrack to bring in the good prairie wool. Build another haystack, another store of feed to keep his cattle alive and healthy throughout the long winter. And next summer, do it all over again. Just one of many jobs to be repeated with the seasons. The same thing, over and over, hundreds of times over dozens of years. Repetitive, maybe. Boring, never.

  At least, that is Eric’s view this calm summer afternoon.

  Each hay-season, each day is different. Even in midsummer, the weather can be anything from scorching heat to cold winds threatening rain or hail. Always some concern lurking at the back of my mind, like a coyote waiting to pounce if I neglect something. Sometimes I worry about the hay crop growing mouldy, sometimes about it blowing away. During the ‘30s there was so little hay, I scrounged every acre and even cut crop for feed. And then had to sell off half the cattle at a loss rather than see them starve.

  The early years of married life were anything but easy for him and Catherine.

  The crash of 1929 combined with drought that struck in the mid-1930s hit Sas
katchewan a knockout punch. No work, rock bottom prices for farm produce, and years of dust storms and grasshoppers brought the rural economy to its knees. Soon after Catherine enjoyed her one and only taste of college life, the small rural academy was forced to close its doors. If students could not pay tuition, the school could not pay its teachers.

  The college was only one in a long line of casualties. Stores, banks, farms, every community had its own litany of closures. Gasoline, like almost everything else they needed, was scarce and expensive. Farmers who had begun to move into the era of machines reverted to horsepower. Even automobiles were harnessed to horses and grimly dubbed “Bennet buggies” in reference to their unpopular Prime Minister.

  When war broke out in Europe in ‘39, and Mother Britain was attacked, it was inevitable that Canadian boys be dragged into the fray. And yet, even with conscription, some had to stay behind to keep farms producing. Growing food became a patriotic necessity. While younger brothers donned uniforms and disappeared into the maelstrom of international conflict, Eric, farmer, husband, father, continued working his farm, planting and planning and harvesting and bargaining, while his mind filled with the horrendous events that played out so far away and yet influenced his every waking moment. Catherine kept their radio tuned to 540, the somber voice of a CBC newscaster their direct line to the Western Front. No victory or defeat achieved reality until it was broadcast into their own living room. Their spirits rose and fell with each advance or defeat. They talked in horror with their neighbours of the bombing of London and breathed a prayer of thanksgiving with every letter home from the boys overseas.

  But since the success of the Normandy invasion and the liberation of occupied Europe, they had all breathed more easily. The Nazis were defeated, democracy and freedom had been secured. Derwood, assigned to the radar division, had never been sent overseas. Catherine’s brother Warren would be returning to Canada from England. And Gerald, after taking part in the Italian campaign and the liberation of Holland, was also on his way home.

  Eric grins at the thought of Gerald. His letters sound like he’s spent as much time thinking about home and the farm as we spent thinking about him and the war. And he was as happy as I was about the CCF winning the last election!

  It will be good to see his brother back here, starting his own farm with the help of the Veteran’s Land Act. It will be a fresh start for all of them, a chance to concentrate on their families and their farms.

  And that is more than enough to worry about. Eric’s smiles as he glances back at his two little girls, their blonde heads a shade lighter than the hay. He feels a secret pride that his firstborn shows the same sense of responsibility that he values in himself. She will be someone other people can count on. Look how we already count on her to watch out for the little ones.

  By now they are past the midpoint of the windbreak-trees and have turned into the caragana-bordered lane. From their perch atop the load, the children can see over the lilac hedge behind the house yard.

  “Daddy,” calls Carol, “we have company! Whose car is that?”

  A tall young man strides into the lane, smiling as the hay rack pulls alongside him.

  “Hello there, brother!”

  “Well! Gerald, you’re back! Welcome home!”

  Eric loops the reins to the hayrack frame and scrambles over the hay to lift down the smaller of the two girls to Gerald’s outstretched arms.

  “Say hello to your uncle, Johanna.”

  Gerald holds the child at arm’s length for a moment, his cheerful face beaming with goodwill. The usually shy little girl impulsively flings her arms around his neck.

  By now the older girl has clambered down, too, and cries excitedly “Uncle Gerald! Uncle Gerald! Do you remember me?”

  In one motion he sets down the first and scoops up the other, exclaiming “I cannot believe how you’ve grown, Carol! Eric, you’ve got quite a family now, you and Catherine and your three girls.”

  “Carol, take Johanna inside with you and tell your Mama that Gerald and I will be in for coffee as soon as he helps me get this load stacked.”

  Turning to his brother, Eric adds, “You do remember how to use a pitchfork, I hope?”

  Gerald laughs as he swings himself up on the rack and shakes out the reins.

  “If you only knew how I’ve been looking forward to this!”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Saskatoon bush. Grows from 1-6 meters tall. Alternate ovate leaves with rounded tips. Smooth reddish-brown stem turns grey with age. Five-petal white flowers, blooms in late spring. Fruit red to purple round berries. Commonly grows in coulees and open woods. Fruit a valued food source. Gabriellas’ Prairie Notes

  Gabby (2012)

  Remember the promise I made to myself? The one about putting questions and speculations concerning aboriginal history into the vault for a few days? Well, I tried, I really did. And for most of Monday, I succeeded. I let my mind fully inhabit the year 1945 as I wrote a piece based on Eric’s and his daughters’ memories, and attempted to picture him as he was then, at that time in his life.

  Then, late in the evening, an email came from Madeline Hirondelle. She wanted to know what I had made of the files folder she had given me.

  I responded that the information intrigued me, and I hoped to delve more deeply into her family’s story. I asked if she might have any first person accounts she would be willing to share with me. I mentioned my interviews with the Tollerud family, and how well it worked to use a composite of memories to build the story. Then I waited.

  Ms. Hirondelle replied early the next morning. Against all odds, I must have made a favourable impression. She stated that if I was truly interested in pursuing research into a time that preceded settlement, I should come to visit her. At her home. This week, if possible. She explained that what she offered could not be considered part of the Centenarian Project, as the ancestor whose information she would share was her grandfather, who had died in the first third of the last century. Madeline had compiled family stories preserved by her mother, as well as genealogical material researched by her granddaughter. A multi-generational project. It still seemed unlikely that I would meet Madeline’s mother, who was indeed a Centenarian.

  But. The good news was that Madeline the Teacher had overcome the misgivings of Madeline the Daughter, and, within limits, would share her family story if I first steeped myself in the early history.

  That was exactly what I wanted to do. Learn about the time long before reservations and residential schools, when aboriginal people had more control over their day to day life, if not their destiny. I not only accepted Madeline’s prerequisite, I embraced it. The gap of lost years between Eric’s early memories and the Indigenous history of Jeff Reletter’s book might be partially filled by the material Madeline suggested.

  I fired off a reply saying that, before the First of July weekend, I could take a few extra days off. I could come to see her on Thursday, if that suited her.

  Then I renewed my resolution. Back into the vault I stored that wild mysterious period of history, out of sight and out of mind, and turned my attention to my day job. Exploring a different bit of history. That was surprisingly easy for me to do. I realized that in some strange way I had begun to identify with old Mr. Tollerud, to feel a proprietorial claim on his memories. I wondered if learning a personal Indigenous narrative might have the same effect?

  Time would tell. For now, I would concentrate on recording as best I could Eric Tollerud’s century of life.

  The fact was, I really liked the old guy.

  I checked my notes from yesterday’s conversation with Jo and Carol. They’d talked more about their mom than their dad, and I felt I was getting a good sense of the character of their mother. It was obvious Eric was an aloof figure to his children, respected, looked up to, maybe feared. But it was plain that they and their siblings had adored their mom. A clearer picture of the woman who had married Eric, who had been his partner and lover for almost sixty year
s, was emerging.

  Luxuries and modern conveniences had been lacking, but, from the memories these two old ladies shared, it was plain their childhood had been rich in other ways. Providing a happy and secure home had been Eric and Catherine’s major achievement.

  I looked at my notes again and saw that their youngest child was born in February, 1950.

  “Almost a whole month overdue,” Carol had exclaimed laughing and shaking her head, as though even now, the thought of her mother’s epic pregnancy amazed her.

  Why shouldn’t that period be as memorable for this little family as the end of a war?

  Eric (1949)

  The winter had been brutal.

  Catherine buckled galoshes over her shoes and pulled on Eric’s second-best winter jacket. It was warmer than her own coat, and the way the snow was slapping against their ice-shrouded windows, she felt in need of every bit of protection she could muster.

  “I’m getting the wash off the clothesline before it blows into next week,” she told Carol. “Make sure that James or the girls don’t get too rambunctious and start running around the heater.”

  The kids were kept home from school often this winter. It had been way too cold to send them out on horseback. Seeing they did not fall behind in reading and arithmetic had been added to her other jobs. Keep the house warm, keep from freezing. Keep the propane heater and the coal and wood stove burning but keep her babies and her house from being burned. Always busy, keeping her family fed, warm, clean and happy. Keep on keeping on.

  That’s what we are, in winter. Keepers. Eric keeps the animals fed and watered, keeps the generator and windmill working, keeps the barbwire phone connected so we can call on a neighbour in emergency or loneliness or to share a funny story. We need to keep on going and wait for spring.