Moon of the Crusted Snow (Moon, #1)

by Waubgeshig Rice

This was his offering of gratitude to the Creator and Mother Earth for allowing him to take this life. As he took from the earth, he gave back. It was the Anishinaabe way, as he understood it.

When he was new to the hunt, the sympathy and sadness he felt after pulling the trigger lasted days. Now he was a father himself and necessity overcame reluctance and regret.

It was more than enough for his own family of four, but he planned to give a lot of the meat away. It was the community way. He would share with his parents, his siblings and their families, and his in-laws, and would save some for others who might run out before winter’s end and not be able to afford the expensive ground beef and chicken thighs that were trucked or flown in from the South.

Most importantly, hunting, fishing, and living on the land was Anishinaabe custom, and Evan was trying to live in harmony with the traditional ways.

In the coming weeks, the temperature would drop and the snow would come. Soon after, the lake would freeze over and the snow and ice would be with them for six months. Like people in many other northern reserves, they would be isolated by the long, unforgiving season, confined to a small radius around the village that extended only as far as a snowmobile’s half tank of gas.

The trees and some of the wildlife around them were preparing to sleep while the humans prepared for the great annual test.

She was an old soul. He wanted her to question everything. He wanted her to grow up to be strong and intelligent. He wanted her to be a leader.

It became so normal that everyone forgot about the root of this turmoil: their forced displacement from their homelands and the violent erasure of their culture, language, and ceremonies.

Despite the hardship and tragedy that made up a significant part of this First Nation’s legacy, the Anishinaabe spirit of community generally prevailed.

Survival had always been an integral part of their culture. It was their history. The skills they needed to persevere in this northern terrain, far from their original homeland farther south, were proud knowledge held close through the decades of imposed adversity. They were handed down to those in the next generation willing to learn. Each winter marked another milestone.

The weathered faces of the dozen or so elders in the crowd analyzed his body language with their chins held high.

This protocol had once been forbidden, outlawed by the government and shunned by the church. When the ancestors of these Anishinaabe people were forced to settle in this unfamiliar land, distant from their traditional home near the Great Lakes, their culture withered under the pressure of the incomers’ Christianity. The white authorities displaced them far to the north to make way for towns and cities.

But people like Aileen, her parents, and a few others had kept the old ways alive in secret. They whispered the stories and the language in each other’s ears, even when they were stolen from their families to endure forced and often violent assimilation at church-run residential schools far away from their homes. They had held out hope that one day their beautiful ways would be able to reemerge and flourish once again.

giving thanks for health and all the other gifts from the Creator.

When it came time for questions before wrapping up, only about a dozen people remained, scattered behind Aileen, who sat stoically in the front row. Her poise appeased Evan. He noticed an easy smile on her face. She’s lived through it all, he thought. If she’s not worried, then we shouldn’t be.

At the end of this road was the Northern Trading Post, owned by the biggest grocery chain in the country, who had a monopoly in First Nations in the North. Not only was this general store the only outlet for food, it also supplied all the hardware, household supplies, and other domestic necessities. While prices were better than they had been before the road was built, they were still outrageous compared to what people paid in the South. A two-litre carton of milk usually cost ten dollars. Sometimes it went up to fifteen.

He was disappointed to discover how few hunted anymore. Many had grown complacent in the rut of welfare.

The children were learning their language earlier and better than their parents had. Evan and Nicole had grown up in an era when Ojibwe wasn’t spoken much with the younger generation at home. It was only two generations before Nicole and Evan that speaking Ojibwe was punished at the church-run schools that imprisoned stolen children, and the shame attached to it lingered. Evan and Nicole had vowed to make things different for their kids. They had given them Anishinaabemowin names with pride — Maiingan meant “wolf” and Nangohns “little star.”

Aileen was the last of the generation raised speaking Anishinaabemowin, with little English at all. She was one of only a few dozen left who could speak their language fluently. She remembered the old ways and a lot of the important ceremonies. She had more knowledge than everyone else about the traditional lives of the Anishinaabeg.

“The world isn’t ending,” she went on. “Our world isn’t ending. It already ended. It ended when the Zhaagnaash came into our original home down south on that bay and took it from us. That was our world. When the Zhaagnaash cut down all the trees and fished all the fish and forced us out of there, that’s when our world ended. They made us come all the way up here. This is not our homeland! But we had to adapt and luckily we already knew how to hunt and live on the land. We learned to live here.”

“Yes, apocalypse. We’ve had that over and over. But we always survived. We’re still here. And we’ll still be here, even if the power and the radios don’t come back on and we never see any white people ever again.”

“Onaabenii Giizis,” he proudly proclaimed out loud. “The moon of the crusted snow.”

Onaabenii Giizis usually referred to February but it could also apply to early March. He remembered hearing two teachers dispute about it when he was younger. One of them was convinced it meant the time at the peak of winter when the weather was so cold the snow simply froze over. The other said it was later in the season when the weather fluctuated between freezing and milder temperatures, causing the snow to melt and then freeze again, creating a crust.

Now the milestones he used to mark time were the deaths in the community. The toll was rising steadily as people perished through sickness, mishap, violence, or by their own hands. Even in a place as familiar with tragedy as a northern reserve, it had reached levels he had never experienced.

The thick cloud cover insulated them from the stinging air of a clear, windy day. It reminded Nicole that there would be an end to this season, as there always was.

But this was real, and she was sure of it. She was sure of her children’s warm skin and beating hearts. She had felt their breath close to her as she dressed them for this trip outdoors. She was determined that they would survive and thrive on this land, despite the building sickness and despair around them.

Evan spoke up behind them. “Neat, eh? Can you think of any other important lessons in that story?” “I know! I know!” said Maiingan, shooting up his hand. “What’s that?” “Don’t be greedy!” “Don’t be greedy!” Nangohns echoed. “That’s right,” Evan said. “And always be ready for winter.”

And when it became clear to them that they were never supposed to last in this situation on this land in the first place, they decided to take control of their own destiny. Their ancestors were displaced from their original homeland in the South and the white people who forced them here had never intended for them to survive. The collapse of the white man’s modern systems further withered the Anishinaabeg here. But they refused to wither completely, and a core of dedicated people had worked tirelessly to create their own settlement away from this town.