The Game of Shepherd and Dawse (16 page)

That night when Charlie got to Joe’s house, he saw the Zimmer frame but made no fuss about it, and instead enquired in a fake northern accent, “Tutt knees again Joe”?

“Eye lad, tutt knees again”, Joe replied with his own fake northern accent, which always made them both smile when they did their ‘northern talk’ together.

“Sounds like ya need summit to take you mind of your aches and pains our Joe, mmmmm,” Charlie mused. “You could read us both a storrry? What say you kidder?”

Joe would have answered straight back in northern style back but Charlie had made him giggle too much, and he couldn’t hold the tone of the accent.

“You’ve certainly got a way about you, young Charles,” Joe said in his regular deep voice. “How could I say no to that? Okay, then. Go on and settle in to your beanbag chair and I shall grant you your wish, even if it is a bit earlier than usual”.

CHAPTER TWELVE

JUJU

“
The man who appears weak may only be guarding his strength carefully”. ~ Soladus

Juju was the name that Sasha and Aisha gave their daughter’s child because it reminded them how Aman would always be the first each spring to go and pick the juju berries. If it were not for this fact, Juju would never have been born in the first place.

Juju’s life would be a difficult one, right from the start. Firstly, he needed to recover from Aman’s addiction to the juju seeds, owing to the quantity she had consumed during her pregnancy. Juju would howl the place down one minute, then be unnaturally quiet the next which made him an unusual child, but then again he was half Shepherd and half Dawse. At times he would look just so cute, even though he had the look of the Dawse in him. Other times he would appear as pure evil, depending on how he was behaving.

Sasha and Aisha certainly had their work cut out bringing Juju up, and at times he would indeed push the patience of everyone around him. It would be fair to say he was half bad and half good, half loved and half hated. But everyone whom he upset knew where he came from and they cut him some slack for that. Besides when he wasn’t being an aggressive little horror, one could say he was the most adorable and charming young man you would ever wish to meet.

SHEENA TEEWOK LIBRA AND JUJU

There were many times the villagers would have banished him from the settlement, had it not been for the fact that this troublesome child reminded them so much of Aman. Half the time anyway. If it weren't for the unconditional love that all the villagers had afforded Juju, there's no telling what kind of trouble he would have gotten himself into. The tribe managed to keep the Dawsey side of him at bay, mostly. But the Dawse gene ran deep in Juju and there was no way of predicting when he might next implode.

Juju was always on the fringe of Shepherd Wood right from the start, not that people treated him this way on purpose, it was just that he was so different. Juju missed out on a lot of things, partly because of the way he would act and partly because no one naturally gravitated toward him, on the occasion that someone would try and include him he would mostly do something foolish and hurtful which meant that there were never any second invitations.

He would never find love because there wasn’t anyone else in the world like him. He did at times try to force himself on some of the females, but that only got him more trouble and fewer admirers. It was like he was part animal and part human, and Juju sometimes felt this division down to his core. This disconnect bothered him, which in turn upset him because he was bothered by it. When his emotional pain would become too much, it was then he would lash out and become violent. The only way that the nonviolent people of Shepherd Wood could deal with him was to surround him with a hunting party and usher him out of harm’s way until he calmed down.

Juju’s appearance was a mixed bag too. He always had scruffy hair but his face was always clean, but the rest of him - apart from his trousers - was as scruffy as could be, much to the dismay of Aisha who would always be nagging him about it. He also had one brown eye and one blue eye which the rest of the tribe found quite fascinating as they all had brown eyes. He also had brown hair which was a mix of his mother’s blond hair and his father black hair.

Juju did indeed have some amazing talents, but there were other things he just couldn’t seem to grasp. He was great at making hunting tools and anything that could be used to kill something with and because of this he did help to increase the kill rate to the benefit of the now-enlarged community. However, he had no gift whatsoever for tracking and he had very little patience for anything that required dedication. At times, he would eat his meat raw and attack his meal as though he hadn’t eaten for days – again much to the disapproval of both Sasha and Aisha. At other times, he just wouldn’t be able to stomach his meat unless it was really well cooked and without even a hint of blood to it. It would all depend on what mood he was in. In time, Aisha learned to gauge what was coming and would prepare the meat accordingly.

His personal hygiene followed the same uneven trend, as Juju could go days without even coming close to washing and then suddenly appear spotless from top to toe. The best way to describe his facial appearance would be to say that he was a really good-looking ugly man.

Teewok had very little to do with Juju in the early days. When he witnessed Juju’s nasty side, he often resented Juju for what had happened to Aman and how he had come to be born. Teewok was not proud of the feelings he was having toward the boy because Juju was, after all, Aman’s child. Teewok himself had become melancholy and rather withdrawn and would consult Soladus many a time over the years about his lingering depression, at which time Soladus would admonish him.

“Teewok", Soladus would say, “Juju doesn’t make you unhappy and neither does Aman’s passing make you unhappy. It is Teewok who makes Teewok unhappy”.

On one particular occasion after consulting Soladus, the message that Soladus was giving him finally resonated in Teewok's head. To try and make himself feel better, he decided to go for a little stroll and found himself over on the far left of the encampment. In days gone by, he and the other boys would run stone throwing competitions there to see who could win Aman’s heart. He remembered that he could barely even throw as far as Aman, let alone twice the distance she could throw a stone.

The more he thought about Aman, the more upset he became, until his emotions had nowhere else to go. He picked up a brownish white looking rock and threw it with every ounce of the repressed energy and pent up emotion that was inside him. Sure enough it flew, and flew and flew. The brownish white rock landed in the grass right next to the double-way marker and this at least pleased him, as this was the first time he or anyone had come so close to it. Teewok made a run for the marker to see exactly how close he had come and to his amazement the stone was about one centimetre over the marker line.

Teewok cried for joy that day. Later when he cleaned up the stone, he discovered it was a beautiful, rounded piece of alabaster. It may have been a gust of wind that carried the stone so far that day, or it may have been a fluke throw, or it may have even been some form of divine intervention. He’d never know for sure, but from that day forth, Teewok made a promise to the spirit of Aman that he would do all he could in helping Juju on his path.

Teewok took his role as mentor to the half-breed child very seriously, so much so that he never did take a soul partner. He deeply believed his soul partner had come and gone and he was more than prepared to wait for his next life to meet her again. Out of all the inhabitants on the plain, it was Teewok who could best gauge when Juju was about to flip or lash out at someone, almost as though he had some form of guidance from a higher source.

As Juju grew older, he developed a measure of respect for Teewok, as did Teewok for Juju. Even at the age of 14 summers strong, Juju could easily have overpowered Teewok as Juju was a very tough lad, but Teewok’s mind was sharper than Juju’s and that always gave Teewok the upper hand.

Sasha had all but given up on Juju. The end for him came the winter Aisha passed over to the other side and Juju spat on her face as she lay there, even though he had spent the first half hour of the ceremony appearing to mourn her. It was antics like this that had made so many of the inhabitants grow weary of Juju.

Soladus was by now as old as anyone could remember any previous resident being and some thought he was immortal. No one really knew exactly how old Soladus was and when someone did ask him when he born, he just replied, “In the winter”. And that was that. However, Soladus now sensed his time had come and he was ready to go after his long life spent on the plain. He had gotten to the stage where he could barely use his hands anymore and therefore could no longer contribute to the community.

Once a person became like this in Shepherd Wood, they could choose to pass over in the comfort of their adode or they go out into the cold of night, take off their top clothes and let the elements take them. Not because they had to, of course, but because they wanted to. It was considered the greatest honour a human could bestow upon one’s Self.

As the time drew near, Soladus called one final meeting with the elders. Even though they were the elders of the tribe they were like children compared to Soladus. They all gathered around in a large stone circle with the fire pit in the middle that was slightly sunken into the ground so that everyone could see everyone.

He began his last speech, but Soladus began not by talking himself but by allowing every member of the elders to talk about the fondest memory they had of him or to talk about the way he may have helped them grow along their journey. To the amazement of Soladus, most of the fond memories and best advice he had given came from times when he hadn’t consciously tried to give any advice. True to his nature, Soladus shared one last piece of knowledge with the other elders in an attempt to show that no matter how wise you are or how wise other people think you are, you never stop learning until the day you pass over.

Once all of the elders had shared the best experiences they'd had with Soladus, he shared the magic moments that he'd had with them. It was a very joyous occasion and many tears were shed but these were not tears of pain or mourning, as these were tears of pure joy. The evening centered upon the celebration of the life this amazing man had lived. Once everyone had said all they wanted to say, Soladus shared his final words.

“My children, my people, my dear friends”, he began. “It has been an honour to have been among you, and it has been a pleasure learning so much from you on this night of nights. Now I bid you all farewell and I look forward to meeting you in another life. My choice for Passover partner,” he paused, “is Juju”.

And that was it. That was his final speech.

On this, his last day, he wanted them to remember just one thing, and that was no matter how old or wise you think you are, you can never stop learning from the young.

A Passover partner was a member of the community who helped the dying person make his or her last preparations. It was usually a member who had helped that particular person greatly at some point in the dying person’s life. A couple of the younger of the elders made no attempt at hiding their confusion and trepidation at this choice, while the older more experienced ones knew that such a wise old man had made his choice for good reason.

Makeshaw who was by now gaining quite a reputation for being wise himself remained the calmest, but he couldn’t help but smile at the immensity of the last deed that Soladus was leaving them with. Soladus acknowledged Makeshaw’s smile as if to say, “You have learned well, my child”, even though these thoughts passed back and forth without either uttering a word to the other.

When one of the Elders decided to pass over like this, it would only be the other elders who would be present in the meeting hall. The rest of the community would, in a mark of respect, stay in their dwellings – at least until the elder had gotten to their final resting place. There wasn’t a lot left in the world that could surprise Soladas; he had been around for many years. But as he walked out of the meeting arena, he did get his very last surprise. On the other side of the river, every single inhabitant of Shepherd Wood had gathered on the riverbank and each of them held a candle to light the way for their ageing seer. It wasn’t supposed to be done like this but because of their immense respect for him, they couldn’t help themselves and it touched Soladus very deeply.