Traditional Societies Assignment (T3)

[My] grandmother went berry-picking and found blueberries.  Oh my, I had never tasted blueberries until then, I really liked the taste, especially with sugar on them.  And my grandmother went berry-picking again and fed me some and I asked for sugar, but my mom told me: “There is not enough sugar for you to put on your berries.”… But I had seen where my mom had stored the sugar.  She had put it in a syrup pail and hung it in a tree.  Well, as soon as I thought no one was looking that way, I went up the tree, climbing up for the sugar.  Well, climbing up far enough to reach it, I just used my bare hands to dip into the pail for the sugar. But a bee must have gotten inside the pail, too, trying to steal the sugar, too, and wouldn’t you know it, it stung me!  By gosh the sting really hurt, and I just fell down off the tree; oh, I cried as hard as I could.  When my grandmothercame running, “What’s wrong iskwew? (she used to call me iskwew), I was crying so hard.  “A bee stung me while I was trying to take some sugar for myself over there.” “Oh my oh my, serves you right!” my grandmother said to me, “maybe this will teach you not to try and steal things again.” No one felt sorry for me when the bee had stung me so hard.

-Mary Wells, Elizabeth Settlement

(Our Grandmother’s Lives As Told in their Own Words)