Taki lived beside the whale bone arch in Point Hope, Alaska, at the edge of the Chukchi Sea.
The arch is made of two bowhead whale jaw bones planted in the ground, forming an enormous gateway from the land to the water and from the water back to the land.
It says quietly to the world, "The Balaenidae mysticetus gives it's life to the people, and the people give their lives to the bowhead whale."
Her house was made of yellow wooden slats and a red tin roof.
It had four windows.
There was one for each side of the house.
She could see the north, south, east and west of the Arctic land, sea and sky.
A little chimney rose slightly above the roof.
Smoke from the evening fires swirled ever so gently above the town into the night sky.
It thinned itself up and out into the star filled sky.
She sat by the fire in the front room, warming herself against the long night of the deep Arctic winter.
She looked out over the Chukchi Sea.
The water was calm.
The stars reflected off of it and made little lights as far as the eye could see.
Ice floes moved snail-like with the tide.
Whales sang to each other.
You could hear the sounds, feel the life and death, of faith and doubt, hope and despair, love and hate.
"Small spaces," she thought, "hold the world together.”
At that moment she saw a boy standing under the whale bone arch.
The wind blew off the icy sea and whipped his brown face until he became a part of the salt, sand and sea.
The shirts and coat he wore weren't enough to protect him from the cold.
The skin of his cheeks and the water in his eyes froze with the night sky.
"He looks so small against the sky and the sea," she thought.
Small things struggled to survive around the Chukchi Sea, she knew.
Her heart was big and warm.
This helped her live in that cold, icy place.
Her eyes were brown and kind.
This helped her see in that fierce, white land.
"I bet his heart is big and warm, too," she thought.
She took a lantern out of the window and headed out into the night to guide him in.
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