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    The Autobiography of Blue Woman Volume One
    The Autobiography of Blue Woman Volume One
    The Autobiography of Blue Woman Volume One
    Ebook93 pages1 hour

    The Autobiography of Blue Woman Volume One

    By Ernest M. Whiteman III

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    The Autobiography of Blue Woman

    The life of the Northern Arapaho, Blue Woman, and her two children weave through ten compelling, contiguous but not continuous stories about life on the Wind River Reservation and beyond. You will meet her children Moon-Swallow Girl and Corn-Silk Boy, her father Bad Horses and the famous Arapaho filmmaker Savior Sherman. You will also read the tragic tale of the Last Indian on Earth, all told in a unique style and voice.

    "The Autobiography of Blue Woman" is a short story collection that circumvents the expectations of conventional Native American-themed and authored stories. Part One of a four part series containing thirty-three stories, "The Autobiography of Blue Woman" spans five generations and travels from the desolate beauty of the Wind River Reservation to the urban wilderness of Chicago to an unknown time and place.

    Blue Woman will haunt you, amaze you and confound you. You will never forget Blue Woman.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherErnest M. Whiteman III
    Release dateDec 4, 2013
    ISBN9781311230164
    The Autobiography of Blue Woman Volume One
    Author

    Ernest M. Whiteman III

    Ernest M. Whiteman III is a Northern Arapaho filmmaker, artist, writer, media educator, and former child superhero. He graduated from Columbia College Chicago with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Film/Video Directing in 2004.Ernest is still in production on a full-length, full-text feature film contemporary adaptation of HAMLET that will feature a full cast of Native American actors. He works on a couple of online series on YouTube, has completed a western genre screenplay, "Nameless: A Western", and is working on an urban Indigenous zombie script.As a writer Ernest has completed a novel-length unpublished manuscript, "Once Upon a Time on the Rez" in 2003, and has self-published a collection of short stories entitled "The Autobiography of Blue Woman". He continues to add to the world of Blue Woman. He has completed and published to Smashwords his second novel manuscript "A Rez Tale".As an artist, he is working on a ledger art project, “NAMELESS: The Authentic and Magical Ledger Art of EW3” which has had a preview showing at the Citlalin Gallery in the Pilsen neighborhood of Chicago and is currently featured on the book arts website Affinties. He continues to randomly draw stuff.Ernest serves as the Director of First Nations Film and Video Festival, Inc. a 501c3, non-profit film festival dedicated to supporting Native American directors of all skill levels and working to find them a venue to express their views and screen their works, and works hard at securing venues and film and promotions for two annual film festivals.Ernest works as a Teaching Artist for several organizations, such as Chicago Arts Partners in Education and the Chicago International Children's Film Festival. Ernest teaches an upper-level course “Native Americans in Media” at the University of Wisconsin Parkside where he develops curricula based on Native American first-voice and self-representation in media, media literacy, his concepts of the Authorship of Expertise and how it pertains to authority, expertise and representations of Native American culture and media.Ernest has Associates degrees in both Native American Studies and Radio/TV Broadcasting from Central Wyoming College in Riverton, WY. He was selected as part of the Illinois Humanities Roads Scholars Speakers Bureau for 2021-22. He currently lives in Skokie, IL. Not bad for a nameless Arapaho from Wyoming."As an artist your greatest enemy, is your own history." Brian Eno 2011

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      Book preview

      The Autobiography of Blue Woman Volume One - Ernest M. Whiteman III

      The Autobiography of Blue Woman

      Volume One

      A Short Stories Collection

      By Ernest M. Whiteman III

      Copyright 2013 Ernest M. Whiteman III

      Smashwords Edition

      This e-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This e-book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you are reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

      Blue Woman: A Dedication

      To all the women in my life, most especially – Bonnie, Charlotte, Samantha, Elvira, Val, and my mother Mary Ann, all my beautiful nieces and aunts, sisters-in-law and all others, past, present and future, friend or foe, you have had a hand in shaping the person I am, I dedicate this collection. You are Blue Woman.

      For April.

      Origin: the First Story of Blue Woman

      Blue Woman was a compulsive gambler. That was how she lost her two children Corn-Silk Boy and Moon-Swallow Girl. She did not lose them to Social Services because of her vice; she lost them on a bet.

      It was a starless, moonless and partly cloudy night when she left to find them. She knew she would miss the wide-open sky and the swath of stars at night of her home sky, but after a week without her beloved children, she made plans to win them back. She cashed her per cap and hocked her guitar and left on the next bus for Reno, Nevada.

      On the way there she met an older ex-convict named Chauncey Shatner. Chauncey is dying from a rare type of cancer and is traveling the U.S. by bus to to keep it on the human level rather than seeing it all from above. It was his dream to sit on a west coast beach and die at sunset. He is so obsessive about his death that he made a list of things he wants to do before he died. The next item on that death list: experience love. It was then that Blue Woman sat next to him. Their eyes lock as the bus pulls out from the station.

      Blue Woman could not help but fall for the dying man. It is her nature. Not to fall in love instantly, but to gamble on her trusting heart. They spent the night in a hotel in Awkward, Nebraska, swearing that they would spend the next day together before re-boarding the bus, as they slowly undressed each other.

      The next morning, Blue Woman awakes alone, finding her ticket and her purse still on the night table, but Chauncey had taken all her cash and left on the bus alone that morning, forgetting his promise to stay. Blue Woman dresses and decides to find her beloved children.

      -o-

      I think I love you, Blue Woman moaned in the middle of their passion.

      Thank you, was Chauncey's only reply.

      -o-

      Picking up her things, Blue Woman finds a note of apology:

      Thank you for loving me. If not for a date with Death, I would love to be your lover the rest of your life. You have brought me a step closer to Heaven.

      I love you too.

      CS

      -o-

      As she boards the bus and takes her seat, she thinks of ways to reclaim her lost cash. She also thinks of Chauncey and his painful death. Notes are nice, but notes did not replace lost money and destiny did not get the dishes done. As the bus rolls out of Awkward toward Cheyenne, Wyoming and eventually, Reno, she thinks of her lost children, of her compulsive nature and of gambling her heart on a dying man.

      Blue Woman had lost another bet.

      -o-

      Moon-Swallow Girl left her new guardian in less than a week after arriving. The Sun, who loves her, finally made his way to her and fulfilled his promise he once made years and years before, when he first fell in love with her. There was neither hesitation nor protest from the new guardian at all.

      Her new guardian spoke loudly of his fondness of the Sun. He told everyone within earshot that he loved everything having to do with the Sun. So much so, that he had images of the Sun on almost everything he owned. He spoke to so many people of his fondness for the Sun that word reached the Sun and the Sun showed up at his doorstep. The guardian opened his door and immediately died of fright.

      Moon-Swallow Girl believed that her new guardian was a person who spoke one way but acted differently when faced with the real thing.

      She packs her things and leaves with her new husband, the Sun, but only after he tells her of the promise he had made.

      -o-

      Hello, my brother, she says to Corn-Silk Boy.

      Corn-Silk Boy nods his head and sips his tall cup and ponders the definition of the word, respect. Of course, he looks nothing like the woman who has called him her brother. He has to wonder why white people do that. He goes back to his book and never gives her another thought.

      -o-

      Blue Woman sits at the blackjack table amassing a huge stack of chips. She has been there for three days straight on one of the luckiest streaks ever witnessed. On her mind the whole time: her daughter and her son. Around 2am on the fourth day, the person she is waiting for finally arrives.

      -o-

      Corn-Silk Boy is stuck. He is stuck in a place he cannot get out of without some great sacrifice. It is here that his patience paid off. He sits back; un-wraps his sandwich, begins his lunch, and waits. He chews and plans.

      -o-

      Moon-Swallow Girl is not even burned when she makes love to the Sun.

      -o-

      Blue Woman looks over her hand. She had always loved the slick feel of the plastic-coated cards. Her opponent and she broke even all night and all day. Though they both won hands and lost hands, they only seem to bet enough to break even. As though both knew what the stakes should be but dare not go there yet.

      -o-

      Corn-Silk Boy had come up with a plan, a bold plan. To escape his present reality, he had to do what Indians have done for centuries. To keep the secrets of his people, he had to give up the one thing that Arapahos must never lose; he had to give up his name.

      -o-

      As it is the Sun's compulsion to circle the earth, so it was that he was away when Moon-Swallow Girl gives birth to twins.

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