Ilatsiak - 3

“Ah, old man! Another nice day to sit in the sun and be lazy...”
“I’m too old to hunt... I was never any good at it anyway. I should have starved to death long ago!”
“Yes maybe that’s true...”
“It couldn’t be helped! People kept passing me food whenever I got thin. To be polite, I had to eat it.”
The conversation began in the customary way. Each one teasing the other. Patsy, telling the old man he was far too old to be around. Ilatsiak pleading that it wasn’t his fault. He had tried to die many times, but people always got in the way and saved him.
“So, old man,” began Patsy again. This time he had a more serious tone to his voice. The long Spring days were beginning to get boring even with the new arrivals here at the trading post. “Where have you lived all your life? Did you always starve in the eastern lands?”
“Yes, always in the east, towards the sun.” Ilatsiak paused, deep in thought. He too was feeling the hot sun, the long days and his many years, now well over ninety of them, kept him glued to the ground, no longer able to move around like the younger men. Another lazy mouth to feed. “I have always lived in the east, farther than I do now, many days of travelling.”
“Tell me a story about that land, old man. What is it like?” Patsy too had time to spend. There was little to do and being sixteen years old and at an age when he was anxious to begin having adventures of his own, he loved to hear the stories of the old ones.
“I will tell you about meeting my wife. She is gone now, but she lived in a place with a high water falls which never freezes in the winter. It is a big river which comes from the south. Where it comes from no ones knows. It’s from the land of many lakes where it is easy to kayak for a lifetime and never paddle the same lake twice. Her people lived by those falls and my people used to visit them each fall when it was time to fish and hunt caribou for skins.”
And this began a time of stories for Patsy and Ilatsiak. Slowly, Patsy learned the story of the old man’s life, and what he had seen and done. He had been a remarkable man, of that there was little doubt.