Growing Up Native American

by Bill Adler

  I told her, “I don’t never have bad dreams and can take care of myself.”

  She asked me, “May I help you with your nightgown?”

  Then I knew she was going to do bad things like the orphanage woman and I wanted to grab Billie Jim and run, but I didn’t know where I was. I started to back down to where she said to sleep and she said, “It’s all right if you don’t want any help. Have a good sleep.”

  She went into her room and I watched until she closed the door. There was a lamp beside the bed and I slept with it on.

  The first thing I did the next morning was check on Billie Jim. I asked him if they messed with him and he said no again. Nobody came into the room I was in either. We got dressed together and then went downstairs. Already Paul and Grace were up and at the breakfast table.

  Grace asked, “What would you like for breakfast? Pancakes or bacon and eggs?”

  Billie Jim said, “We can pick?”

  “Sure,” Grace said, “all you have to do is to wash your face and hands before coming to table. Can’t have you start the day with a dirty face.”

  We looked on each other and saw we was dirty.

  Grace said, “There’s a pump here, if you want, or you can go upstairs to the bathroom.”

  We wanted to use that red pump with the very high handle. I tried to make it give water, but Grace thought she had to help push it down. She put her hand over mine but I moved mine. She smiled though, so I let her pump the water into a tin basin and give me a big brown bar of soap. She said she made it out of pig fat. It smelled icky but it made lots of bubbles.

  After we ate, Paul said, “Come on, kids. I’ll introduce you to our animal friends.”

  He put on his hat and opened the green screen door. There wasn’t no grass nowhere. Just dirt, except where there was tall stuff growing. Paul told us it was alfalfa and wheat and that it got really high before you cut it. He took us into the barn to show us Henry, who was this old horse what lived there forever.

  Out back of the barn was a pen with big fat pigs and a mommy one with some babies. I didn’t like them much, but Billie Jim asked if he can touch them and Paul said, “Sure,” so Billie Jim went into the pen and one of them pigs ran after him so Billie Jim screamed and the pig pushed him up against the barn wall so Paul had to chase the pig away. Billie Jim done good though and didn’t even cry.

  Paul walked us to the chicken house and showed us Rhode Island Reds and bantams. He taught us how to fill a basket with eggs by taking them out from under the chickens. I thought the chickens was mean, though, because they tried to bite us. Paul laughed and said as how it will get easier to do. Then we met the cows and Paul tried to teach us to milk them. I couldn’t make nothing come out, though Billie Jim got a little. The warm milk tasked icky. We walked all over the place that morning and then we got to ride on a tractor with Paul for a long time.

  I was sleepy, but Billie Jim wanted to do more things, so we went down to this wooden bridge which went over this river that Paul showed to us. He said we should be very careful to not fall into the river because it was very fast and we would be drownded.

  Down to the bridge, I layed on my tummy and Billie Jim was on his and we poked at knotholes in the wood. The water was so fast it went around and around while it was going all wavery at the same time. When we put sticks through the knotholes, the water would just pull them right away like it was never going get fed another stick. We did that a long time until we heard Grace calling us to lunch.

  At the lunch table I asked, “When will we start doing the work we came to do?”

  Paul and Grace looked on each other as though I had asked something stupid and then they smiled.

  Paul said, “You came to live with us to be just like one of our children. You will have lots of time to play and go to school. You’ll have some chores because everybody on a farm has to work. One of you will help feed the chickens. One of you can care for the pigs. You can both help with Henry, and there’ll be times when you can ride Henry, all by yourselves, into the woods or across the fields, after you learn to ride him. Other times we will all go to town or picnics or pow-wows or rodeos. Everybody has to have time to play. That’s the way it is.”

  Then Grace said, “I’ll teach you how to sew and can and cook, Jodi Ann. You and I will go on special walks and plant a garden together. You too, Billie Jim, if you want. I want us to be friends and happy together.”

  I heard everything they had to say, but I was waiting, too, for the strange things I was sure they would do. I meant to keep my ears and eyes open just in case we needed to run somewheres.

  About three days after going to her house, Grace tells us at breakfast table that, “Today is a good day to plant the garden. What would you like to grow, Billie Jim?”

  “Potatoes an’ rhubarb!” he says, all excited.

  Then she asks me and I said, “Carrots and string beans, ma’am, because they’re red and green. It’d be pretty.”

  She patted my shoulder and said, “Yes, it would be lovely. That’s nice you can see that, Jodi.”

  I put my head down so she wouldn’t see me smile.

  Grace got this basket with lots of little envelopes and told us, “Come on.”

  We went outside, round to the side of the house. Paul was waiting, sitting on his tractor. He said, “It’s all turned over for you.”

  Grace said, “Thank you, Paul,” to him, and to us she said, “Here’s two places for each of you. I’ll go down to the other end.”

  She moved to her place and went down to the ground on knees and hands. Billie Jim and me just stood there because we never planted nothing before. She gave us some envelopes which shook with stuff, but they didn’t mean nothing to us. Grace saw us standing and asked, “Have you children ever planted things?”

  We shook our heads no so she came over and give us little shovels, like spoons, and took hers and made a little hole and put in a seed and covered it over with dirt. Then she put water on the place. She said, “You just do it like that, all in rows. Then you put the envelope on a stick here at the back of where you’re planting. Then we wait for the rain and sunshine to help them grow.”

  She patted Brother on the hand and went back to where she was working.

  We spent a long time doing gardening. The dirt felt good, like stored-up rain smells. We ate lunch by the garden and Grace said, “I think we deserve a walk. Let’s go down by the river, kids.”

  Down to the river, Grace showed us different plants and birds. She knew a lot about birds. She told us the songs by making whistles through her teeth. She tried to show us how to do whistles with grass between her thumbs, but I think my teeth weren’t big enough. Billie Jim didn’t have a tooth in front, so he couldn’t do it either. She showed us these grasses, too, that she said made baskets and we picked some. When we got back to her house, she put them in a big round pan, like for taking baths, and filled it up with water. That night she bit some grass apart with her teeth and showed me how to weave them in a basket. She thought I didn’t know how to do this, but my grandmother already showed me before. I forgot some though, so my basket wasn’t so good. She said, “You’ll get better.”

  Grace read a story to us, then Billie Jim and me went to bed. When I was going to sleep, I thought on her telling about the birds.

  One morning time I woke up extra early. The house was all quiet and I thought to go see some birds. I got dressed and went, real soft, down the stairs. I stopped on hearing noises in the kitchen. I crept up to the door and saw Grace putting water in the coffee pot, then poking embers in the stove. She went back to the sink and stood in the new sun coming in the window. She took one hand in the other and she rubbed on her swollen-up knuckles and all up and down her fingers. She put some stuff, what smelled like Vicks, all over her hands and slow rubbed her knuckles. Then she opened and closed her hands lots of times and rubbed more. She looked out the window the whole time, making a little smile all the time she was rubbing on her fingers. It looked li
ke she done that lots of times before, so I stood still, so she didn’t see me because the sun is so nice on her skin and shining in her hair, kind of like baby rainbows. I just wanted to watch. I did that for a long time and then made sounds like I was just coming down the stairs.

  Grace said, “You’re up very early, Jodi.”

  I said, “I wanted to go see birds and stuff.”

  She said, “If you want to come with me, I’ll show you something magic.”

  She reached out her hand, but I put both arms behind my back and took hold of my own hands. She smiled and opened the door.

  “We’ll just take a walk over to alfalfa. I want to show you some colors.”

  We walked between the wheat and alfalfa, the air all swollen up with their sweetness. Grace pulled down a piece of alfalfa and said, “Smell.”

  It was all sharp and tickled inside my nose, kind of like medicine. It got dew on it and it landed on my cheek. Grace got some on her nose. I wanted to touch it, but didn’t.

  Grace said, “See the different colors?”

  She ran a finger down the alfalfa and I saw there was places where it was real dark then lighter then sort of like limes are colored. I always thought it was all one color, but I was fooled. Grace did the same thing with the wheat and said, “And here’s something else that’s wonderful. Look what happens when the sun comes to the plants.”

  Grace moved them different ways and I saw the light changes the colors, too. It’s almost like you can look right through them.

  She said, “If we come back at lunch and suppertime, when the sun is in a different place in the sky, they’ll be different again. Do you want to?”

  “Yeah!” I answered.

  “Okay,” she said. “It’s just for you and me, though, Jodi.”

  Grace told me about the red-winged blackbird, what I never saw before, while we went back to the house.

  Later, Grace called me and we went to see the colors again. They were changed. This time I saw, too, the little hairs each one had, what makes a wheat kernel, all full of lines and different parts just like people.

  Then Grace said we had to go get a chicken for dinner. In the chicken yard, there was chickens scratching at the ground and picking in it for bugs. Their heads bobbed up and down and jerked from side to side. It was funny to watch them. Then, all of a sudden, they all ran to the coop. I didn’t see no reason for it, but Grace pointed up in the sky and told me, “They see the shadow of the hawk. They’re afraid, so they hide because they know hawks like to eat chickens.”

  The hawk circled awhile but went away and the chickens came back into the yard, scratching and clucking like nothing ever happened. Grace walked around in the yard, looking at all the birds, and finally spied one she liked. She chased it until she caught both the wings flat, with the chicken squawking the whole time we was walking to the clearing between the barn and house, to a stump where I had seen Paul split the kindling. Grace said, “You hold the chicken by the feet and give it a quick clean cut with the ax. Do you want to try it?”

  I didn’t never think on killing nothing to eat and didn’t want to do it. I remembered the wild kitten I made friends with out in the tall grass back at the orphanage. I thought about how one of the orphanage matrons killed the kitten and hung it round my neck and told everybody I killed it. All day I had to wear the kitty, but I didn’t cry. I just pretended like the kitty never was important. Now Grace wanted me to kill the chicken and I didn’t want to, so I tried to back away, only she said, “I know you are strong enough to do this, Jodi.”

  She stuck out the handle to the hatchet, but I couldn’t take it. I shook my head no and said, real quiet, “I don’t want to, ma’am.”

  I backed up more and she said, “Well, we need supper. You watch and perhaps you’ll be able to do it the next time.”

  Grace took that chicken and held it on the chopping block and chopped off the head so quick I almost didn’t see her do it. I jumped back when the blood went flying everywhere, all hot-smelling in the sun, and making dark plops in the pale dust. She let the chicken go and picked up the head and threw it in the garbage. There wasn’t no noise except chicken toenails making little scratches in the dry hard dirt and wings trying to fly when the chicken ran around and around. I didn’t want to see it do that, but it was hard to stop looking. It ran in circles whole bunches of times and then just fell down, sort of jerking, till it stopped. That’s when its eyes looked just like Popsickle kitty and my stomach felt like throw up and I wanted to run. Grace pulled out a big piece of string from her apron pocket and I knew it was going to be just like before, when she said, “Jodi, come on over. We’ll string the chicken upside down and take off the feathers.”

  But I couldn’t go near her. I yelled, “No!” and ran into the barn. I climbed the ladder and went behind some hay and pulled it all over me till nobody could see me and stayed real quiet. I sucked in air and didn’t give it back. Grace came and called out, “Jodi, I’m sorry if I scared you. It’s all right if you don’t want to help. Jodi? You don’t have to hide. It’s all right.”

  But I was thinking on how I told a grown-up no and didn’t do what she said. I knew I was going to get whipped. Paul and Grace would send me and Brother back because I was bad. Billie Jim was going to be all mad with me because we had to leave. Didn’t nobody want to keep us if I’m bad and Brother and me most always went to places together.

  I stayed in the hayloft a long time. Then I heard Paul and Brother calling me. They was yelling it was suppertime like nothing was wrong. I peeked through the slats of the door to the hayloft and saw Grace standing in the kitchen doorway. She didn’t look mad. Paul and Billie Jim was holding hands, walking toward the fields, calling my name. Grace looked up to the barn like she knew I was there and started out to the barn.

  I heard her shoes scrape on the rocks in the barn doorway, when she stopped walking. She said, “Hello, old Henry. You need some water, friend?”

  The bucket handle squeaked and there was walking. The yard pump handle went crank crank crank and then water gushed into the bucket. Footsteps came back and there was horse tongue slurping, like Henry was real thirsty.

  Grace said, “You know, Henry, when I was little, I used to do some of my best thinking sitting in the grass up on a hill behind my house. I guess the best place now would be up in the hayloft. It’s the most like a grassy hill right around here.”

  Then I heard the dry snaps of weighted wood as Grace bent the ladder steps coming up. She was puffing a little when she came to the loft ledge and climbed over. I peeked out the hay and saw her dangling her legs and making a hum.

  “Yes sir, Henry, old friend,” says Grace, “this feels almost like my hill. If I were little and scared, this might be just the place to come think. I guess I’d know I was in just about the safest place in the world. Everything would be all right up here. After I had things all sorted out, I could come down and run on home to Momma and know she loved me, no matter what.”

  That was the most I ever heard Grace say in one mouthful of talking. I still didn’t make noise, though. She was talking big, but she was still a grown-up. She sat there awhile, swinging her legs and humming. Then she said, “Well, Henry, guess I’ll go into the house. I’m getting cold and hungry.”

  Grace climbed down and I saw her go to the screen door. She stopped and called out, in a loud voice, “Jo-o-o-d-d-i-i!” She waited a little bit then went in the house.

  I wanted to think nothing was going to happen, but I knew I was going to get whomped. I had been spending most of the day in the barn but couldn’t think on nothing to do, except face the punishment. I went down the ladder and out the barn. I peeked around the corner of the parlor window. Billie Jim was listening to Charlie McCarthy on the radio. He was sitting in Paul’s lap while Paul read the paper. Grace was rocking in her chair, knitting. She looked like my real grandmother except my grandmother is short. I missed my grandmother only thinking on her won’t do no good so I went around to the back d
oor and slammed it real loud, when I came into the house, and marched right to the living room. Billie Jim jumped up and ran to me and said, “You made us real worried. Where was you?”

  He grabbed my arm, but I pulled away and said, “I don’t know why you were worried. I was only up to the top of this grassy hill, what I found, thinking about things.”

  Grace put down her knitting and looked at me. I felt my heart running fast when she looked at Paul. He looked back on her for a little then said, “Was it a nice hill, Jodi?”

  I knew I couldn’t say no more lies without making spit in my mouth because my throat was all dried up and my tongue would stick and not make words, so I just shrugged a shoulder. Grace stood up and started coming toward me. I figured to just stay where I was to take the hit so I was getting ready. Instead, she said, “I’m glad you’re home so we can eat supper. I hope you had a nice adventure too.”

  She reached me and my body was stiff with waiting, but her arms was out like she was going to hug me. I didn’t back down and she closed her arms around me and hugged. I just stood there, still stiff, and she bent down to whisper in my ear. “You’ve got straw in your hair, Jodi.” Then she patted me on the shoulder and we went to the kitchen.

  While she was putting food on the platters, Grace said, “Jodi told me she doesn’t like fried chicken much, so she doesn’t have to eat any if she doesn’t want. We even have two nice pork chops here, with mint jelly, just in case Jodi would rather not eat the chicken.”

  She turned around with a platter filled up with chicken and on the end was the pork chops. They tasted good with jelly. We never got that in the orphanage.

  I watched Grace real good the rest of the time before bed, but she never said nothing about the chicken or me not being good. She never said nothing about it ever again.