Accidentally Becoming A Sliver Back Grizzly

The Sliver Back Grizzly

“Go see Aunty Betty, she has the bear.” Uncle Jimmy Jimmy said in his off-handed way. So, I went to visit Aunty Betty, she just smiled at me and asked me some questions but for the most part didn’t tell me much but native folks seldom do. You got to figure it out. A friend had said to me that he wished he could come and meet and talk to my native friends and listen to what they had to say. I turned to him and explained that in the 25 years that I have been with native elders that what they told me I could put in a small cup but what they didn’t say I could fill books and then libraries with those books. Aunty Betty looked at me and said: “You very intelligent.” That what she said that day I went visit her.

Aunty Betty once said “If you see a bear, pick up two stones and bash them together. It will scare the bear.” I laughed and asked her if she ever tried it. She said, “No.” Then I giggled and said, “That’s a great thing to tell a white guy then,” We both broke up laughing.

Years later I had gone to the hospital to visit Aunty Betty she was dying, she knew it and so did I, although we didn’t talk about it. “Come,” she said, “help me with your hands.” So, I did as I had done in the past and laid my hands, palms up under hers but this time she insisted that she would be giving the gift this day. We sat together palms touching and I prayed to the creator.  What Aunty Betty was doing? I wasn’t too sure, it just felt good to be there with my friend, sharing. She died a days later.

Just before her funeral, I saw this huge “Silver Back Grizzly Bear,” behind me playing with my Totem Animal the Cobalt Grizzly. I thought who is this now? And I phoned Si’Taxulwood and told her what was happening. “It’s Aunty Betty’s Medicine,” she said. I had suspected it was and Si’Taxulwood and I talked. She thought that Aunty Betty had given the “Silver Back Grizzly,” to me so I could give it to her sister Aunty Smitty.

After the funeral, some weeks later I paid a visit to Aunty Smitty and shared the same way with Aunty Betty and I did that day (placing my hands over her hands) and I gave Aunty Smitty the Silver Back Grizzly. I had transfer Aunty Betty’s medicine and now I felt good.

Some six months later Aunty Smitty became very ill and I thought, “oh my god I’m sure it’s the bear, it’s too strong.” I went to see Aunty Smitty at her home and talked to her and asked her if the bear was too much. She agreed it was and so I took the gift back. Aunty Smitty soon got better but did end up getting sick and dying 6 months later. 

Now I was with the Silver Back Grizzly again and felt for sure that I should pass it on like Si’Taxulwood suggested. I thought I would give it to her instead so I stepped into the “Valley of the Grizzlies” (In the Non-Ordinary Reality/Dreamtime) leaving my old friend the Silver Back Grizzly there to be with her clan. I told Si’Taxulwood what I had done and that she could meet Aunty Betty’s Sliver Back Grizzly and she would be waiting. Everything was quiet, I felt finally settled about passing the medicine on. I was honored to be able to be a part of the ceremony, to be able to share in that way.

I was talking to Uncle Jimmy Jimmy years later and he said to me, “If you see a bear on the path, pick up two stones and bash them together. It will scare the bear.” I laughed and asked him if he ever tried it? He said, “No.” Then I said what I had said to Aunty Betty, “That’s a great thing to tell a white guy”,” He found this very funny and we both broke up laughing.  Deja vu! I started to suspect that something was up but I didn’t know what.

Two years later I’m sitting out back of my house beside the fire on a Soul Mate summer night talking to my cousin about “woo-woo,” stuff (Dreamtime and Native Medicine) when he asks me if I can see his bear. “Yah,” I say, “It’s a great big Kodiak. Can you see mine?” I ask. “Sure, it’s a huge Silver Back Grizzly.”

So, at this point I freak. “Oh no, it’s not, it’s a Cobalt Grizzly.” He stares at me again, “No it’s definitely a Silver Back Grizzly.” “It can’t be. Are you sure?” “Sure, I’m sure,” he says “And she’s big.”

 “Well,” I said, “…that just can’t be because I’d lead the old mother Sliver Back into the Valley of the Grizzlies where she would hook up with Si’Taxulwood, two years ago!” Obviously, that didn’t happen and now here I was shocked, floored and dumbfounded, why I would be sitting with Aunty Betty’s Medicine?

I panicked and immediately phoned my mother (who is extremely psychic/clairvoyant/empathic) and asked her impressions of my dilemma.  She felt that the old mother Sliver Back Grizzly was given to me because I had a very kind heart, clear head and no desire for power. And she said what better way to hide something that everyone wanted but to give it to someone that no one would suspect it to go too. Then she said, “You know dear maybe you are keeping it for someone else, like the children.”

I went about trying to understand what I had been given, why and what was I to do to help the old mother Sliver Back (aka Aunty Betty) give her medicine to her people. I checked with my mom again and she seemed to think that I would take the medicine into the Non-Ordinary Reality/the Dreamtime and gift it back that way to the Co-Salish peoples. She thought that maybe Aunty Betty and Uncle Jimmy Jimmy knew the medicine would have to shift in order to keep up with the changing times in order for their peoples to survive.

Uncle Jimmy Jimmy and Aunty Betty had planned the whole thing I was sure of it and I was being Soul Mately manipulated in the process. “I was okay with that.” I phoned Aunty Gwen just to check in because I didn’t want to be “whitey stepping in political doo-doo,” if you know what I mean.  I explained the Dreamtime to her and what had happened and what I tried to do, how the old mother Sliver Back Grizzly had come back and what my mother said. Aunty Gwen said, “Aunty Betty gave it to you, she meant for you to have it for whatever reason. I think your mom is right, she’s a very wise lady.”

I sat for months after that with a new dilemma, “How do I get the bear to move?” She just sat there beside me watching me, waiting for something and I didn’t know what. Then one night I was sharing my Soul Mate Si’Taxulwood stories, wise things she’d told me and I told my friend the, “If you see a bear on the path get two rocks and bang them together…” story and how Uncle Jimmy Jimmy had said the same thing and…then it dawned on me exactly what the two of them were on about. They weren’t talking about a living bear, they were talking about a “Spirit Bear,” about a “Silver Back Grizzly Bear,” that they knew I would meet on the “path,” not the physical path but the spiritual path of life. They were speaking metaphorically. I know what you might be thinking at this point, “Well duh Sherlock nothing like picking up on the obvious!” HAHA! And I thought I was “Intelligent.”

Immediately I went to the front of the house and found two rocks that were of medium size, (the ones that felt good with my heart) said a small prayer and bashed them together. The Bear moved!

And I don’t know why I didn’t think about it before I bashed the rocks together but if the bear moved…so would I. Another part of the whole thing I’d failed to consider before I did the deed. Well of course as soon as I did the scaring of the bear, the bashing of the rocks together, my whole life changed and I became more out there and public than I had ever been in the past. And still, the old mother Sliver Back Grizzly keeps us moving.

Now the only thing about being with the old mother is that the medicine is so strong that I have to make sure I’m using it all the time or I will be in serious trouble. Aunty Betty once said to me, “If you don’t use your medicine it will make you sick.” I can hear her saying it to me as if she was standing over my shoulder right now… maybe she is. I hope so I miss her dearly.

It took 5 years to realize that the Sliver Back Grizzly had taken me deep, deep into the Dreamtime. To the point that I may not have come back. Be very careful, very few people, native or otherwise do not survive this. Make sure you have supports in place to help keep you strong. My recommendation is…DON’T do it!!

Duende (c)