Three old women sit rocking and weaving their baskets. An old man squats in front of the fire and pokes at the embers with a stick of hickory which he has carved long ago. They have been sitting here in this place since the end of time.
      “Tell us granddaughter,” says the oldest of these, “tell us that story. And the young boy. The unisi. Tell us that story too.”
      “Of course, grandmother, but it is only one story.”
      The older woman nods. “Tell us,” she says.

      The story has been told before. The old ones have spoken of these things many times, and I have tried to remember how they go. It was long ago when I was a girl that they were told to me. After that, I lived in the white man’s world, and perhaps I am sometimes confused by the stories of that place.
      My children never knew Indian Country. They were born in udeligv where they disappeared like the red sun at the end of the day. When I was young, I heard the voices of the old ones saying, “walk the white path,” and I thought that they meant the white man’s path. But the white man’s path is the black path, the path of war -of war with himself, and war with the universe. And to this path I have lost my children.
      What is a medicine woman who has forgotten the meaning of the herbs? What is a storyteller who has forgotten the essence of her stories?
      I chose this exile, and so it goes. My stories meant nothing to my children. The Real People were not real to them. I had no story for this new world, no story to bring them into balance with themselves.
      And so I lost them. And now a new story must be told.

      “This new story must begin with the old stories,” says Rebecca, “but the places are all wrong, grandmother. They mean nothing to the boy.”
      “The place is everything, granddaughter,” says the oldest woman. “The place is the story. The place is where we come from. It is what we are. Have you not learned this, yet?”
      Rebecca sighed. “Yes, of course, grandmother. Sometimes I am forgetful.”
      The old man looked up from the fire. “So, tell us,” he croaks.
      “I told the boy all the old stories,” says Rebecca. “I don’t know if he was listening. I wanted to get them right this time. I didn’t want to lose this one, too.”
      “We haven’t lost him, yet, granddaughter.” The old woman opens up her snuff pouch, takes a pinch, and places it firmly between her gum and upper lip.
      “Things are different now in this world, grandmother. I, myself don’t understand the changes that have taken place.”
      “Not so different, my granddaughter’s granddaughter.”
      “No, not so different, Rebecca Ann,” says the third woman.
      “Forgive me grandmothers, but perhaps you don’t understand the meaning of these changes. Elohi itself is in danger. The Real People are no longer a people. So many of us think only of our own needs.”
      “Not so different, Rebecca.”
      “No, not different.”
      “And the young one. He dreams only of escape. He dreams about the stars.”
      “Ah,” says the older woman.
      “Yes, aninoquisi,” says the other, “grandmother, he dreams of aninoquisi.”