THERE ONCE WAS A PROPHET

A young man seeking wisdom wandered onto an Indian Reservation. He was a bit nervous. This place was new and backward for him to be around. There were old cars abandoned on the roadside without tires and missing parts. The weeds growing throughout the hoods of the cars hinted that they had been there a long time and would remain there for some time to come. He was looking for the town center, but he did not know what it would look like or where it would be. He passed by a restaurant called "Smoke Signals" and a gas station with a sign out front that read, "DISCOUNT TAX FREE CIGARETTES". This could not be what he was looking for. Onward deeper into this community of unfamiliarity the boy ventures. He passed by nice houses with paved driveways and mowed lawns side by side with unkempt lots with trailers on them and broken down cars littered about. Some had over protective dogs barking relentlessly, chained to trees in the front yard. There were no wigwams or teepees, although he didn’t expect to see any either.

After a while, he came upon a school and a church across the street from each other. This would be a much better place to ask. It was in the middle of the afternoon on a weekday so he chose the school. There was a bulletin board in the entranceway with announcements on it. One spoke of a solstice celebration in the coming weeks hosted by a Jason Spotted Horse.

A teacher was leaving her classroom and noticed the young stranger in the hallway. She stopped and asked him if she could help him at all. He asked, "Where can I find Mr. Spotted Horse?" He got directions to an old house across the street and behind the church, a ways.

The dirt path may have once been a road, but did little to resemble that now. The house, at end of the leaf littered path, was old and covered with chipped paint, in a faded green pile of rubble near the house that may have once been a garage. Why, he wondered, would anyone have had a garage out here? The house was simple and somewhat out of place. Almost as if someone had transported it from an old suburban community to this location.

He walked up the old yet sturdy stairs to the front door where he knocked three times. After a long pause an old man opened the door. He asked, "What do you want of an old tired man?" The boy replied, "I seek the truth." "OK, you may enter." With surprise on his face the boy said, "Thank you kindly," and entered the old and dusty house.

The house smelled surprisingly clean, especially considering all of the old books lying about in stacks here and there. The interior had been painted in all earth tones: browns, greens, and grays. They find their way into the living room and a couple of comfortable rocking chairs.

"There is not much truth in the world, mostly perception. One thing that I do know is true is that you will be happier if you live each day of your life so that you may wake up in the morning and say to yourself: ‘I have no regrets’. With this said there is not much else that is true except life, death, and love."

The young man thinks about this and then asks, "What about your lore?"

"Our lore is made up of stories that are learned throughout a lifetime. More than I could possible teach you", replied the old man.

"I have been seeking for some greater meaning to life and have already been to the other beliefs and got nothing from them"

"I understand", the old man said, "in my life I can look back on many choices that I have made. Some of them seemed stupid at the time, but later I saw that I learned great things from them. Out of them all there is only one I look back upon and regret as an old man".

He continues, "There is an old legend of a prophet in a far away land to the north that had great wisdom and was willing to share all that he knew and all that he had with any one who would join hem. The legend spoke of him only coming out during the winter for a short time to profess with his community. This is when he would speak of the world and how to live in harmony with nature. He also foretold things to come. One thing he foretold was all of our nations falling from power and all of our people forced into prisons called reservations. He said that we would lose our language and traditions as others were forced upon us. These things were not to be accepted by him and he invited all to join him and preserve our heritage. All you had to do was go to the base of the biggest mountain; back the way from all our people came. There a secret community gathered to learn and live in peace".

"Why didn’t you go and join them?" replied the boy.

The old man continued, "There was one catch. The prophet also claimed that some day in the future, when the time was right and the world was ready for change, all that had joined him would step forth and take back with force that which was lost with force. And, I was afraid that some day I may have to do battle".

"So, what are you a pacifist?"

"There is one other thing. When the peacemaker came about 500 years ago he said that in another 500 years, our people would again ready for change".

"So you thought that if you joined him that you would have to fight, since it had been foretold?" the boy inquired.

"No", replied the old man, "because I would be too old and would have to watch all the others go without me".