Native people such as the Cherokees are just as human and complex and real as Americans are, and our nation needs to respect American Indian cultures and traditions.

Kill every enemy twice, Wilky said. Better than gettin' shot by a soldier pretending to be dead.

A journal is a very personal thing. As far as possible, to write this sort of book you need to know and feel your character as a person and then put yourself into that person's mind, place and time. Trying to stay in that person, place and time is a challenge when surrounded by this very different world of the 21st century.

Another of the hard things about being in a war, grandchildren, is that although there are times of quiet when the fighting has stopped, you know you will soon be fighting again. Those quiet times give you the chance to think about what has happened. Some of it you would rather not think about, as you remember the pain and the sorrow. You also have time to worry about what will happen when you go into battle again.

Do we make ourselves into what we become or is it built into our genes, into the fate spun for us by whatever shapes events?

If it wasn't for good," my mother says, "we human beings would have been wiped out a long time ago. Either the monsters would have gotten us or we would have killed each other off with greed and jealousy and anger. So we have to believe in good. We have to look for the good in ourselves.

We need to walk to know sacred places, those around us and those within. We need to walk to remember the songs.