Better Guns & More Determination

Do you know, my daddy said, setting his book aside and stretching his arms over his head, the principal reason for the loss at Little Big Horn?

Custer believed his own press? I suggested wryly.

He laughed outloud. That too, he said with a smile, but mainly it was that the Indians had better guns and more determination.

Well, there were 1800 of them, I pointed out, and only 268 7th Cavalry. He nodded and adjusted his reading glasses, Poor odds, I daresay, Just because you're Crazy Horse one day doesn't mean you won't be Custer the next.

My mother gave an exasperated sigh and yanked at her knitting. What are you two going on about? she demanded crossly, Look there, you made me drop a stitch! My daddy sighed and got to his feet, assuming an injured expression and giving me a sideways wink. Come, fledgling,he said to me grandly and called the dogs, We shall take the night air for a time. We are unappreciated here.

There was a full moon hanging low in the sky, it looked as it might fall into the ocean and disappear at any moment. Lights glimmered on the water and it was quiet, we could hear our footsteps and the soft hum of the electric wires, the waves slapping against the rocks. We walked to the breakwater by Sparrow's and could smell pipe tobacco - the old man called out a quiet greeting and my daddy waved but didn't stop - instead he led me out to the very end of the wharf, sat me down, and began to talk. He talked for a long time, about a lot of things. Sometimes he sat, sometimes he paced back and forth, sometimes he stood with his back to me, cigarette in hand and looking out over the water. Some I understood, some I didn't but I listened to it all and asked no questions. It seemed to be a combination explanation/history lesson/apology/confession/warning and growing up speech all in one - I was to turn seventeen that very month - and I guessed that he thought the time had come to pull back some of the curtains. He talked about my grandfather's alcoholism as well as my mother's, about loyalty and marriage and integrity, about peacemaking and how families could become strangers, about how he missed his own sisters and brothers and wished he saw them more often. He talked about human dynamics and relationships, about emotional breakdowns and loneliness and how to substitute work for intimacy, about failure and success. And finally he talked about responsibility and consequences, about being and behaving in the adult world, about finding the right path and not straying too far from your dreams. Compromise when you have to, he told me seriously,But never on your principles, never with your true self.

We returned to the house to find my mother and grandmother in a heated argument over a card game. Always the arbitrator, my daddy calmed the waters and proposed a solution - call it a draw and change to dominoes. The two woman gave in sullenly and my mother abruptly changed targets, trying to provoke a secondary argument about who had finished off the last of the brownies. My daddy shrugged it off, recognizing the tactic and refusing to engage her which in turn only made the situation worse and she stalked off with a self righteous glare at us both.

Not all battles are bloody but oftentimes you have to wait for the smoke to clear before you realize who actually had the better guns and the most determination. It's not always you might think.