“Do youse kids know the one about Nanabush and the geese?” he asked. The lamplight glimmered in his brown eyes. The children shook their heads. The adults on the other side of the room cradled mugs of hot tea that had been made from boiled snow on the stove in the basement. Evan tried to relax after a long day of walking through heavy snow checking on elders and carrying loads of firewood indoors. The muscles in his back were tense.
“Well, it was early in the fall a long time ago,” Dan continued. “Nanabush was getting really hungry. He knew winter was coming and that he had to get ready. He didn’t have much food saved up yet. You know how me and your daddy go hunting a lot before the snow comes?”
They both nodded.
“Well, Nanabush was behind. He shoulda been hunting for weeks. But he was getting lazy. He was too busy swimming and eating the berries that come late in the summer. But then those ran out. And he decided it was finally time to go looking for food. So he walked down to the lake to try and find some geese.
“He walked for a really long time and didn’t see any. ‘Did they already fly south for the winter?’ he asked himself. ‘If they did, I’m in real trouble.’ He knew that the snow was still a couple weeks away. But sometimes the ones with wings know the seasons better than we do. For all he knew, they could already be gone.
“He kept walking up the shoreline, looking all around him and listening. Then all of a sudden he heard something in the bush up from the shore. It sounded like singing and yelling. He couldn’t tell what exactly it was, so he walked up the little hill into the bush. ‘Who’s making all that noise?’ he said.
“He came to a clearing in the bush, and he saw the geese! They were singing and dancing around. They looked really happy. Like it was a party! So Nanabush walked up to the one closest to him. ‘Goose!’ he said. ‘Why are you all singing and dancing?’
“‘We are leaving soon for the winter, Nanabush,’ said the tallest goose. ‘We are giving thanks and asking for a safe journey and good health along the way.’
“Nanabush looked around. He counted thirty geese in that circle in the bush! Can you count to thirty?” Dan asked his grandchildren.
“Oh, I can!” Maiingan raised his hand and rapidly fired off numbers until he reached the mark.
“Well done, my boy!” said Dan. “Now do it in your native language.” The boy repeated the numbers in Anishinaabemowin, which took a little longer.
Dan picked the story back up. “So the geese were leaving for the winter. Do you know the Anishinaabe word for winter?”
Nangohns’s hand shot up. “Biboon!”
“Ehn, yes, my girl. That’s right! Good job.” He looked above them to see Evan, Nicole, and Patricia smiling on the couch.
To conserve precious resources, the families did most things together, rotating the hosting responsibilities. The idea was to save on firewood and food by living more communally. The only unpredictable variable was Cam. Sydney and their son stayed with her parents, but Evan knew Cam often wasn’t there. He would return to the duplexes where Scott ruled.
“So anyways, the geese were all dancing around and singing.” Dan’s gestures became more animated as the story’s action built. “They were very plump, because they had to eat a lot for their journey south. They needed lots of energy to fly that far. Nanabush started licking his lips. Look at all these geese, he thought. They’re enough for me to get through the winter! And they’re so fat!
“Nanabush was the trickster. So he started to think of a plan to trick them. ‘My brothers and sisters,’ he said. ‘Let me join you in your celebration. I want to wish you well on your journey to the South, so I’d like to offer you a dance.’
“‘That’s very kind of you, Nanabush,’ said the tallest goose. He was the leader. ‘We would be honoured if you joined our celebration. Please feel free to offer us your dance.’
“‘Okay,’ said Nanabush. ‘It goes like this. You have to close your eyes and spin around in a circle. You have to keep your wings by your side. It’s like you’re imagining yourself in your warm new home for the winter.’” Dan stood up and demonstrated the move for the children. They giggled as he spun around with his eyes closed and a silly grin on his face.
“So the geese said okay, and they started to dance like Nanabush showed them. He looked around, and they all were spinning in circles with their eyes closed. He walked up to the big one closest to him that he’d been talking to. He kept real quiet and slowly moved his hands down to the goose’s neck.”
He mimicked the motion, leaning forward and peering into the kids’ eyes. They sat totally still.
“Then he wrung his neck!” He thrust his hands forward in threatening grips and startled them. “Then he sneaked over to the next closest one and did the same thing. And then the next one, and the next one, and the next one. They were all dancing with their eyes closed and singing, so they didn’t hear him. At the end of his evil trick, there were thirty geese lying there dead. ‘Now I won’t go hungry this winter!’ Nanabush said to himself.”
Despite their grandfather’s jovial tone, Nangohns’s and Maiingan’s eyes slid over to their parents, who continued to sip their tea, unconcerned.
“So Nanabush took all the dead geese out of the bush and piled them up by the shoreline,” Dan went on. “He stacked them neatly. It was a long day, and he was really hungry, so he started a fire to cook one of the geese. ‘I am so hungry and I am so tired,’ he said. ‘But I’m happy with my new bounty for the winter. I have all this food to myself!’
“But he was so tired, and he knew it would take some time to cook the first fat goose that he just stuck in the fire. So he decided he would take a little nap. To make sure he woke up in time before the goose got burnt, he asked his diiyosh — his bum — to wake him up.”
“His bum!?” squealed Nangohns.
“Yes, his bum!”
Both children kicked back in laughter.
“Nanabush turned and looked at his diiyosh and he said, ‘Okay, diiyosh, you better wake me up. I don’t want to burn that goose. I’m just going to have a quick sleep. You make sure it turns out okay. Keep an eye out too. Make sure no one takes all our food.’ So then Nanabush went to sleep. He slept for a really long time. Longer than he wanted to. Then all of a sudden he woke up. He was startled because the sun was starting to set and his diiyosh hadn’t woken him up.
“Nanabush looked right at the fire. It had become really big! He saw the goose’s long legs sticking out of the fire on the rocks at the edge of the firepit. He went to grab them to pull out the goose, but the legs were all that was left! The goose was in there for so long that it totally burned up. He looked at the legs in each of his hands and got really mad. Then he remembered the rest of the geese! He turned around quickly and saw that the whole pile was gone! Something came and took them all while he was asleep.
“‘Diiyosh!’ he yelled. ‘You were supposed to keep an eye out! Now our supper is burnt and our food for the whole winter is gone!’ Nanabush was so mad that he wanted to punish his diiyosh for not doing the job he asked it to do. ‘I know!’ he said. ‘I’m going to put you in the fire as punishment for not following my orders. You’ll know from now on to listen to me!’ So Nanabush sat down on the edge of the firepit and put his diiyosh in the fire.”
“He put his bum in the fire?!” said Maiingan. “Why would he want to hurt himself?”
Dan tilted his head sideways and continued. “It did start to hurt! It only took a few seconds, and Nanabush’s diiyosh was totally on fire. ‘Owwwwww!’ he screamed. He jumped up really fast and started running around in circles.” He sprung from his chair and shuffled quickly around the kids’ spot on the floor, circling them while holding his butt. High-pitched laughter soared through the room.