Old ways vs. new ways

Well, I do believe this is to be one of my final journal entries.  It's been great, but life must go on and we will now part ways.  Or very soon.

Today's topic shall be old ways vs. new ways.  What do you think of when you hear old ways vs. new ways?  Land-line vs. cell phone?  Typewriter vs. computer?  Vhs vs. dvd?

Not me.  I'm thinking more dog sled/snow-machine.  Skin boat/aluminum boat.  Harpoon/high-powered rifle.  Get the point?

Now, let's think about our native ways for a second.  The foods we like to eat- moose soup, smoke-fish, seal oil for example.  We've been eating these foods for longer than we can remember.  Our first reaction to someone telling us we can't do something is to say that we've been doing it since before you came along and now you're telling us we can't live our traditional native way of life.  But what about all the other ways that go along with eating foods that someone else may not be able to?  They have been lost somewhere along the way.  Speaking the language our ancestors did.  Special dances, maybe.  Special gatherings- the list goes on.

Why were these ways lost?  Or why are they being lost?  Younger generations have little interest in them.  They have X-boxes, internet, fast sno-gos, you name it.  But do they like eating the things that most other natives do?  You bet they do.  Are they going to take the time to learn the ways of old?  No, because they always have "better" things to do.

Take a minute now & then to teach your young while they are still young about these old ways.  Maybe it'll stick.  In a generation or two, these old ways are likely to be lost forever if you don't.  Before you know it, someone's going to say "you can't do that, it's unfair to allow only you to do it."  When your reply is "but it's our native way of life", they're going to take a quick look at your shiny new Polaris snow-machine (with a GPS mounted on the dash) that you're sitting on that allows you to climb near-vertical inclines, and that brand-new high-powered Remington rifle strapped to your back with a high-powered scope which allows you to see across the bay on a foggy day.

Guess what their reaction is going to be?  They'll have one word for you- "what?"