Miriam Moore reads TheWalkingPeople:ANativeAmericanOralHistory, by Paula Underwood.

Grass Ocean

Easeful living and Ancient Songs in our settlements in the Sheltered Valley.  We see a new people who were bear and not bear.  These had long fur, were tall, yet never walked on four feet.  We saw them carry bundles.  When they walk between our houses, taking an interest in our women who are proving to themselves they will not bring out young, we start discussing security issues.  Then the winters become colder, and the summers shorter and colder.  We must make a great change.

Our decisions about the Ancient songs in our new comfortable valley. We live here in comfort for many generations.

We begin to realize the telling of our long walk south through endless mountains was lost.  We wonder how no one remembered to tell of it, and determine that we will sing of our such paths, however usual it may seem.

2005? LaDonna Coy sent me her telling of a story I do not otherwise know.  

Another voice singing soul songs. 

What it is to be one of a People for whom guilt and sin just is not even possible to think about.  There is so much that brings joy and kindness.

They will never be able to do so, and will never believe this.  They will only think that they can make it for themselves as if we had never lived near them, sent our young, and some of our women, to live with them; nor we the people, who truly lived near them. 

You are crippled with Juvenile Rheumatoid Arthritis.  You try to be as cute as anyone, and succeed except when you move.  Awkward in every way, and grumpiness soon to follow, from over achieving that rubs you with growling weariness and jabs of pain.  Being social is a lot of work when standing is a pain.  I want to know the artistic ones, and begin to find places to sit.  Then my work comes to know me.  Watercolor, drawing figures, fast, and reading Growing Woman, my Paleolithic selfs story, to you. 

You are crippled with Juvenile Rheumatoid Arthritis.  You try to be as cute as anyone, and succeed except when you move.  Awkward in every way, and grumpiness soon to follow, from over achieving that rubs you with growling weariness and jabs of pain.  Being social is a lot of work when standing is a pain.  I want to know the artistic ones, and begin to find places to sit.  Then my work comes to know me.  Watercolor, drawing figures, fast, and reading Growing Woman, my Paleolithic selfs story, to you. 

How do they communicate without using words,  and why do the male persons outnumber the female persons three to two ?  We discover they cannot see us beyond a certain distance, nor if we approach unseen and do not move.  Three of our strongest women decide to go among them to get an even closer look.