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05 Wolakota Project Video Transcripts and URLs.docx · WP-0120. Imported source record; individual Elder status and tribal affiliation are not inferred.
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Interview transcript
There was one that our grandpa always tells us. He always says, remember this story because it has something to do with a child. And then he said that was a long time ago in tipi times. And every time they sit down to eat the hakela, the youngest of the family was a little boy. They call him hakela. And he always cries and pouts because you know he was kind of spoiled in a way. And the older children always say to their mother, Mother, why don't you do something about him? Every time we're going to eat, he spoils our meal. Why don't you do something about it? So he'll stop that crying and whining. So the mother says, oh, OK. So she said, Hugh, come on. She said, you're going to stand outside until you're done crying. So she put him outside the tipi and she went back in. And here they were all laughing, talking, enjoying the meal. All of a sudden, the oldest son said, Mom, our little brother is not crying anymore. Maybe you should bring him in. She went out and here there's nowhere to be found. So the mother went from tipi to tipi, all that camp. She went around and asked if they had seen her son, the hakela. And they said no. So at that time, at that hour, she used to go in the woods and she'd be crying, looking for her son. She's been doing that for I don't know how long. And one day she was doing that here, somebody tapped her on the shoulder and he said, why are you crying? He said, I am. I am the son that you put outside our tipi. This is me. So she looked and he was all like a hairy young man. And I said, I am your son. And told her more who he was, how he was raised. So she stopped crying and looked and they were talking. And so I'll tell you why you're like this. So he said, when you put me outside the tipi, he said a big, hairy man like me came and took me. He took me and he said he'll take care of me. So I won't be crying. So he did. He really is a good provider. This hairy man. He taught me how to hunt. He taught me how to butcher and he taught me how to cook. So this is how I am. So that must have been years and years later because he was now a young man. So my grandpa always says, don't ever, ever put a child outside at night because you'll never know what will happen. So that is my favorite story that grandpa always tells. And he calls that he hunk a hoppy. He looked like an image of a ghost, like, you know. So he calls the hunk a hoppy. So, you know, when he took him, he took him far away from that camp into a cave. And he grew up with animals. And he said even the birds, they talk to them. So, you know, that's always my favorite story because it's about a child. So we always say, don't put your children outside or, you know, close your windows, you know, because in teepee times there's such a thing as windows. You know, my nephew Virgil said, you know, in teepee times people are trusted so much that there's no padlocks on their doors. He makes us laugh. Oh, it's telling some kind of joke.