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By Root 453 0

this will be your first opportunity to know this, to know what I am putting [on tape] here so you can think about these things. And one time when you are listening to this, so shall you know it for the first time and for certain how I speak to the Spirit about things here, how I give speeches about history, what happened with me, how things were with my parents, those old men and everything. One time I will be helped to remember and will thusly be told so by your fellow Indian. This is the reason I see in my mind for me to help the Indian people when they are considered for it. And also when you help your fellow Indians yourself, and when they ask you about the things you know, this will be the reason you are so knowledgeable. So this is why I am telling about these things. Sometime I’ll tell you more things. A long time ago I told about this, I told you to speak yourself as you’ve become able. I really did tell you that. And sometimes I will not be able to make it over there to White Earth. We can’t know everything that [will happen]. I’ll say I’m going to go over there on Friday. But maybe I won’t be able to go. Perhaps my car will break down. I don’t know. Do you know? Truly, certainly you will be able to carry all of this and to speak and do all these things you’ve thusly come to know about. And this is why I’m telling you this. You are the only one who can understand it. And you speak well. This is why I was so happy that you said that we would speak about that which I am saying.

[58] I have more that I want to talk about but maybe we’ll be erasing [over what’s already been said]. And I might fill up five or six [tapes]. And now that I think about things, things about the elder men, there are [many] different things I have to say. And also, it is now known here that I am able to speak about them for you to listen to me as well as whomever else of these Indians, so that they can become learned too. And we are loved. We are loved and that’s why I am able to speak here. The [Spirit] helps the [people] with what I am always telling you.

[59] And that’s what that old man told me in a good way as well. “Not there. Learn what I am telling you here. Remember it well. And never forget it,” he says. “I won’t be here forever,” that’s how he addressed the matter. I won’t be here forever [either]. It is up to you to know this here. So this is why I’m telling you. And don’t ever forget it. Don’t forget to help your fellow Indian in whatever is asked of you. Never be shy, never, to talk to him about this. And so I help [the people] in the things for which they are considered. And always, all the time I express my thanks that my fellow Indians listen to me about these things and are customarily so quiet there at the Drum Ceremonies so the Indians listen to me. They listen to the speakers. That’s why those old men are so knowledgeable there. This is why I am an old man myself. And this is why I am so knowledgeable, by listening to those old men, like that Naawigiizis and Gimiwan to whom I listened. This is how I’ve come to know things. I’ve come to know everything about my speaking by listening to them. And there was another certain old man I used to listen to named Eshpan. Then I also used to listen to Niibaa-giizhig about everything. That’s everything being thought of in unison here, how I came to listen to them and think about things I was told by that one old man and that other one over there. This is how it is with everything—everything of which I have knowledge there, that’s why I’m knowledgeable about it. I am thusly not knowledgeable about everything with which I’ve come into contact. But for those who are thought of, I help them in a proper way with everything I know. Those old men were considered in these things for a reason, so that they could give me that which I would come to say.

[60] So then, never forget this. Some time you will definitely come to know this. Maybe tomorrow, or the day after, as you are from a different place, you go around working, and maybe you won’t remember it. But one time when you are there,