The Reason You Walk

Wab Kinew, an Anishinaabe (Ojibwe) journalist, writes this memoir about the final year of his father Tobasonakwut's life, weaving it with his family's story across generations. The book traces how colonization, residential schools, and intergenerational trauma fractured the Kinew family, and how Tobasonakwut, whose name means "low-flying cloud," pursued forgiveness and reconciliation before his death from cancer in December 2012.

The memoir opens more than a decade earlier, when Wab stood in a sundance circle, the ritual space of the sun dance ceremony, at one of the lowest points in his life. Chiefs placed his father's war bonnet on his head and presented him with a treaty medallion symbolizing the obligation to share land with newcomers, making him a chief. The gesture represented a second chance after years of self-destructive behavior.

Tobasonakwut was born as one of twin boys on the family trapline near Lake of the Woods in Northwestern Ontario; his twin died of scarlet fever in infancy. He grew up in the traditional Anishinaabe way, completing a vision quest, a fasting spiritual retreat, as a young boy. His childhood ended when the Canadian government forcibly relocated his people to reserves and a priest took him to St. Mary's Indian Residential School outside Kenora, Ontario. The residential school system aimed to "kill the Indian in the child" (87), stripping Indigenous children of language, culture, and identity. Tobasonakwut's hair was cut, his name was replaced with the number 54, and he was beaten for speaking Anishinaabemowin, the Ojibwe language. A nun raped him, and further sexual abuse by both men and women followed. His closest friend Miigoons was beaten by non-Native men and died. When his father was killed by a car in 1947, a nun strapped Tobasonakwut for standing beside the coffin in Anishinaabe tradition rather than kneeling. At sixteen, he beat a young priest in a boxing match, and no one at the school hit him again.

After the residential school, Tobasonakwut worked in pulpwood camps and trained as a boxer. He married Margaret and had three children: Darryl, Diane, and Danny. Near Kenora, Tobasonakwut and his brothers John and Fred became the "Kelly Boys," fighting racial segregation and channeling their resistance into the Indigenous rights movement. All three became grand chiefs of Treaty #3, representing Anishinaabe First Nations in the region.

Tobasonakwut's alcoholism destroyed his marriage. He met Kathi Avery, a social work student from Toronto, and she joined him at the Onigaming reserve, helping build the Treaty #3 organization. One night in Thunder Bay, he declared a bottle of beer would be his last, endured severe withdrawal, and never drank again.

The family endured devastating losses. When eldest son Darryl, at nineteen, confessed to contemplating suicide, Tobasonakwut berated him instead of offering comfort, a response shaped by residential school trauma. Darryl died by suicide shortly afterward, and nephew Pee-wee was killed on the highway. Later, Tobasonakwut's son Danny died in a car accident. Visions of Darryl led Tobasonakwut south to the Lakota sundance ceremonies in South Dakota, where he found new spiritual community.

Wab was born on the last day of 1981. The family moved to Winnipeg for better schools. Though Tobasonakwut had stopped drinking, his anger persisted in verbal abuse toward Wab and Kathi. Wab learned to fear his father. At sixteen, he entered the sundance. At university, he began drinking and fighting, and was arrested for impaired driving and assault. Tobasonakwut spoke on his behalf in court and, at the sundance, gave him his war bonnet. Sundance leader Leonard Crow Dog made Wab a chief as a reminder of his obligations. The birth of his sons Dominik and Bezhigomiigwaan motivated Wab to change, and he built a career at CBC.

In 2008, Prime Minister Stephen Harper delivered a formal apology to residential school survivors. The following year, Tobasonakwut accompanied national chief Phil Fontaine to meet Pope Benedict XVI in Rome, testing the Pope's sincerity by offering him a sacred eagle feather. Tobasonakwut befriended James Weisgerber, the Archbishop of Winnipeg, who later participated in a sundance. In 2010, Wab and Tobasonakwut returned to St. Mary's for a televised documentary. Tobasonakwut recounted his abuse on camera, and father and son embraced for the first time. Tobasonakwut also delivered his testimony to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission entirely in Anishinaabemowin, preserving the language residential schools had tried to erase.

Wab reconnected with Lisa, a medical doctor he had previously met and was attracted to, who persuaded him to attend a self-help program on the residential school legacy. During the program, Tobasonakwut addressed his late son Darryl: "Why the fuck did you do it?" (92), breaking through years of emotional avoidance. Father and son began speaking openly, becoming friends for the first time.

In February 2012, doctors told Tobasonakwut he had months to live. Wab took leave from CBC, and his sister Shawon returned from doctoral research in Italy. Tobasonakwut announced his intention to adopt Archbishop Weisgerber as his brother through the nabagoondewin, the traditional Anishinaabe adoption ceremony. At Thunderbird House in Winnipeg, Wab led the ceremony as Tobasonakwut, Fred, Phil Fontaine, and Phil's brother Bert adopted the archbishop as a brother.

That summer, Wab traveled to Agawa Rock on Lake Superior for a four-day vision quest. He dreamed of three elements: a grey dirt floor, a peyote button (a cactus segment used in Native American Church worship), and dog meat. On his final evening, watching the sun set over still water, he received his vision: Waves rise and fall like human lives, each able to reflect goodness or lose itself in darkness.

The family rallied around Tobasonakwut through chemotherapy. Shawon and her partner Jesse moved their wedding to Winnipeg so Tobasonakwut could walk her down the aisle. At the sundance at Crow Dog's Paradise, the three elements from Wab's vision manifested during healing ceremonies for Tobasonakwut. In October, the family traveled to Rome for the canonization of St. Kateri Tekakwitha, the first Indigenous North American saint. On the Vatican roof, Wab recognized his father was savoring a victory: The full force of colonization had tried to destroy Indigenous children like him, and it had failed.

Back in Winnipeg, Tobasonakwut's body deteriorated, his stomach swelling with fluid that required periodic draining. He and Wab released an Anishinaabemowin language app and recorded video teachings for future generations. On December 3, he delivered a final three-hour university lecture. His last political observation was pointed: "We will never be free as long as we are under their Constitution" (227).

Tobasonakwut became bedridden. Wab brought his sons for a final visit; they sang to their grandfather in Anishinaabemowin and left without looking back, as tradition instructs. When Archbishop Weisgerber visited and knelt to pray at the bedside, Tobasonakwut broke his silence, delivering a prayer in Anishinaabemowin that blessed the archbishop and called him brother. Wab recognized this as their miracle: not a physical healing but an act of forgiveness from a man profoundly wronged by the Church. Tobasonakwut's last word to Wab was "Ninibaa," meaning "I am going to sleep now." Days before Christmas, he died peacefully and was buried at Onigaming beside his sons, his nephew, and his mother.

Wab kept a sacred fire burning for four days. On the final night, consumed by doubt, he questioned the Creator. Then he saw a single small cloud pass overhead, its underside lit by the fire: a low-flying cloud, a Tobasonakwut. Something shifted. His father's message remained true: Walking the traditional path, even through grief, delivered what was needed.

The memoir closes with Wab reflecting that reconciliation is realized not at a grand political level but when two people come together, recognize what unites them, and respect their differences. To be hurt yet forgive, to do wrong but forgive yourself, to depart from this world leaving only love: "This is the reason you walk" (268).