Extra Reading Diary: Cherokee Stories

Cherokee Stories

The First Fire: The world was a dark place when the Thunders set fire to a a tree on Earth. The animals held a council in order for them to find out how to bring the fire back to them. Many animals volunteered to bring it back. But one after one, they failed to bring the fire back. Pretty soon, the rest of the animals were making excuses to not fetch the fire. A water spider volunteered and wove a little bowl from its thread and brought a piece of burning coal back to the others. Ever since, there has been fire.

(Water Spider, Source:UnTextbook)

The Moon and The Thunders: This story has a bunch of mini stories about the sun and the moon. Every culture seems to have a different idea of how the sun and moon came to be. My favorite was the one where the sun and moon are siblings and the moon acts as the sun's lover. The moon doesn't show his face or reveal his name, so the sun rubs ash on the moon's face and the next day when the moon rises, the sun sees the ash and knows that her brother was her lover. From then on, the moon always avoided the sun, but on rare occasions when they had to be near, the moon would always make himself small as a crescent so it would be hard for him to be seen.

Tobacco and Strawberries: A tobacco plant was stolen by a goose and all the people and animals were upset. One woman was close to dying due to not having any tobacco. All sorts of animals tried retrieving the plant, but the goose kept killing them. A hummingbird volunteered and was able to bring back some tobacco leaves and keep the woman alive. In the strawberry story, a woman left her husband and he mourned for her. The Sun pitied him and set traps for the woman by placing beautiful fruits on the side of the road. It all failed until she came to strawberries, fruit that she has never seen before. She looked back and felt an overwhelming memory of her husband and decided to go back to him.

Reading Dairy B: Marriage Tales

Marriage Tales

Woman Stolen By Killer Whales: A man and woman were out fishing one day and caught a strange looking fish. The woman cut the fish up and went to wash her hands in the water. When she put her hands in the water, killer whales had dragged her into the water for killing their friend. The man followed the trail to find his wife. He got the help of Shark to find his wife. Shark distracted the killer whales and got the woman and swam away. The man and woman looked back to see Shark fighting of the killer whales.

The Rolling Head: A man lived with his wife and two kids in a small tent. Every day he would go hunting, but before he left, he would paint his wife's face and body. When the man would leave, the wife would go to the lake and have an affair with a snake. The man was curious as to how the woman got the paint off and decided to hide by the lake. He saw that his wife was cheating and killed her and the snake. He cut up the wife and cooked her for the children and left. The wife's head rolled in and scared the children. The children ran off and hid in the woods protected by bears and panthers. Villagers heard that the children had plenty of food so they went to live with them. The father eventually showed up and the children set a lion on him.

(Snake, Source: UnTextbook)

The Dog-Husband: A young girl slept with her dog at the foot of her bed. At night, the dog would turn into a human and by morning, transform back into a dog. When the girl became pregnant, her parents knew that it was the dog. The village people burnt the house to the ground, killed the dog, and left the girl. The girl gave birth to pups and provided for them. The girl found out that the pups could turn into humans and made them help provide for the family. The boy-pups became very good whale hunters and a crow came over to see what the smell was. The crow saw that there was plenty of food and tricked the villagers into coming back. The boy-pups became the chief of tribe.

Reading Diary A: Marriage Tales

Native American Marriage Tales

The Piqued Buffalo Wife: A man took advatange of a buffalo-cow and she gave birth to his son. The son grew up and would play with the children in the Indian camps and disappear at night. He wanted to find his father so he went to the chief and picked out his father in a group of men. The child took the man to his mother and they lived happily for several years. The man got angry with his wife and struck her with a hot stick. The wife and son turned into buffalo and ran away. The man was upset and went to find his family. He found the buffalo chief and was told that he had to identify his son four times in order to get his family back. On the last time, the man got it wrong and was trampled by the herd. The wife, the son, and an old bull stayed behind and found a bone that wasn't trampled and brought the man back to life.

(Headdress, Source:UnTextbook)

Bear-Woman and Deer-Woman: Grizzly Bear and Doe were both married to Chickenhawk. When they went to the river to make food, they decided to hunt each other's head for lice. Grizzly Bear said she found lice and bit Doe's head off. She went home with the head and food and cooked the head in the oven. Doe's children knew something had happened so they killed Grizzly Bear's children when they were playing. Bear-Woman found out that her children were killed and went after the fawns. Crane was fishing and let the fawns use his neck as a bridge to cross safely. Grizzly Bear followed and when she went across, Crane twisted his neck and Grizzly Bear fell in the water and drifted away.

Splinter-Foot-Girl: A group of men were out camping when one scratched his leg on a thorny plant. His leg swelled and out came a baby girl. The men loved the girl very much. A bull heard that there was a young girl and sent a magpie to the men for her hand in marriage. The men refused and the bull tried and tried again. The third time he sent a red bird and the men finally consented. The girl went to the bull and they lived together with the herd. The men wanted the girl back and had a mole and a badger steal the girl back. A tree hid the men and the girl in its branches. The buffalo herd went searching and found them and tried knocking the tree over. The buffalo got his horn stuck in the tree and the men killed him. A rock then wanted to take the girl as his wife. But because he abused his previous wives, the animals begged them to run. They tried outrunning the rock, but he overcame them. The girl told him that he was to leave people alone and to be found where the hills are. Her and the men went to the sky peacefully.