Little Ranch Hands

That bastard son of Benny McSween keeps wanting more dreams about his ancestors. I'll send them. He's recorded their lives back as far as 1913. He is impressed. I am not.

I am Chief, the Indian spirit that oversees the land where the McSween Ranch is located.

These crazy white people make me doubt my Native American sanity.

The two brothers, their wives, and their sister with her family all live on the ranch. Their parents, the only ones with good sense, live in the small village of Cedarville. Their father is a blacksmith, their mother a healer and birthing expert. They care for the children during the school year.

Why they put stock in book learning is beyond me.

At least they are teaching their children to work, or what they call work. These people are different from what I know is the true way to live. Each man has a wife, and the wife is beholden to the husband, the way it should be. There are times when their religious sister looks at other men. And her husband takes up with widow women. The others speak of them and laugh. I don't know why it's funny. Are their children going to follow in the parents' footsteps? Will they attend their church and learn about the sins of the flesh, then laugh when a family member strays from their mate?

All I must do is guard the land, the burial sites, and sacred spaces, but I do take care of these poor white people who would probably hurt themselves or die from their foolish mistakes.

I watch over the young sons of the McSween brothers. They should be smarter and stronger than the six girls, but the girls are proving to be smart, and as important in their parents' eyes as the boys. I don't understand their ways, but I feel how they draw strength from the mountains. All of them become one with the earth, and take the serenity of the atmosphere of the ranch into their souls.

Look at the children's lives. Share their triumphs and failures. Check their wild ways as they grow toward adulthood. Their love of the land and family proves they are McSweens.