It's loading... and will appear below this text. It's large and beautiful, and well worth the download. 
The words to Anita will help to fill up the meantime.

Hi Anita...

One of the things that is somewhat traditional to people in general, is gift-giving....
we do it out of love, homage,peacemaking, and to mark events.

This gift marks an event..
Meeting you at the Senator...

As a gift, it symbolizes the immensity you mentioned concerning our and your tasks.
It also allows us to put things into perspective. 

Beyond that,
it shows that much is the same... the world over...

If you have flown over Northern Ontario at night,
and have gazed out the window, down, into the middle of nowhere,
there are small lights that indicate a person, a family, or a community. 

And when we let our minds wander on that plane,
we can imagine the goings on in one of those specks of light.

Supper being cooked, a baby being diapered. People talking after a funeral.

We are on the fringe...
the outlands... yet we have existed...
where-the-light-is-bright once held us...
now we are only sparkles.

Look at the fringes.
the fringes are not only muskegowuk, not only cree,
not even only north american native.
The fringe is an alternative life-world-view on the edges of a band of what some call "light".

Can such alternate views, in any way, survive? Can they grow? 

Will they be allowed to re-establish themselves
and their selfs in the geo-community?

This, (below) is my opening gift to you.

Lark.

© 2001, Lark Ritchie. All rights reserved.