by Sherman Alexie

For three weeks I'd been having nightmares about the possible expansion of the Seattle monorail system. Those nightmares have gotten scarier since election night. 50.2 percent of those dreams were violent and awful, and 49.8 percent were horrible and violent. As if directed by Michael Bay and written by Joe Eszterhas, my nightmares were filled with quick-cut montages of violent nonsense: exploding cars, decapitated children, the Space Needle in flames, half-naked women having pillow fights, ambivalent voters, Ben Affleck. I didn't understand why I was having these nightmares. I'm a freelance writer and my office is five minutes away from my house, so I don't have to commute. And though I've lived in Seattle for eight years, I can only remember being stuck in a horrible traffic jam two or three times. I simply avoid the freeway during busy periods. And if I have to drive during rush hour, I use a complex system of shortcuts and side streets that I should patent. Don't get me wrong. I'm a civic-minded absentee voter and believe we need a more effective public transit system, but the monorail was simply not a part of daily life or thoughts, at least it wasn't until the Floridaesque monorail vote, so why had it become the largest part of my dreams?

A couple days ago, during breakfast, my wife, Diane, asked me how I'd been sleeping.

"Why?" I asked, embarrassed to reveal how obsessed I'd become with public transportation.

"Well," she said. "You were weeping and gnashing your teeth, and you kept saying 'monorail, monorail' all night long."

"I haven't slept well since election night," I confessed. "I'm all shaky and sweaty all the time. The last three nights, when I said I was going to the office, I lied. I drove downtown and parked beneath the monorail and tried to figure out what my dreams were saying to me and what the voters were trying to say to me. Do they want the monorail or not? This vote is so close we might as well flip a coin. It's like choosing between Gore and W. Where's the third-party monorail candidate? Why can't I vote for free bicycles for everybody?"

"Because you hate bicyclists," Diane said. "You'd rather go to a Jerry Falwell prayer breakfast than a bicyclists' tent revival."

She regarded me. She's always regarding me. I think we get married to be regarded.

"You better see somebody about this," she said.

So I went to see my shaman, Edgar, an elder from the Kickakickamish Indian Nation. Old Edgar lives in a tiny house in Burien, which is the traditional homeland of the Kickakickamish.

"Edgar," I said. "I've been having nightmares about the monorail and the low voter turnout."

"They're not nightmares," he said. "They're visions. Don't be afraid to call them what they are."

Like any good spiritual adviser, Edgar was always calling me on my bullshit. I've always been afraid to admit how often I have these visions because it feels so corny and stereotypical. Edgar forces me to recognize my magical talents.

"Okay, okay," I said. "I've been having visions about the monorail. I see the whole damn thing, you know? Stretching all the way from Shoreline to the airport, from Ballard to the Rainer Valley. And I see it burning. I see people dying. I see the whole thing exploding into pieces."

Edgar sat quietly and thought about what I'd told him. He'd taught me the value of silent reflection. After an hour of silent reflection, Edgar finally spoke.

"Many people have come to me with these visions," he said. "I've been seeing these visions, too."

"What do they mean?"

"Well," he said after 15 more minutes of silence. "You must understand that low voter turnout is a cancerous tumor in the democratic body and must be treated with educational chemotherapy. And now I'm going to tell you a sacred story. I don't know if you're spiritually ready to hear it. But I must tell it to you. And you must tell it to the people of Seattle."

"I can't do that," I said. "You're the shaman."

But Edgar wanted to remain anonymous. He's always been anonymous. Edgar isn't even his real name, and he doesn't live in Burien. I've protected his true identity because he believes that spiritual leaders should never live public lives.

"You are the storyteller of Indian people," Edgar said to me. "And you must tell the story of the first monorail."

Edgar proceeded to tell me how the Kickakickamish people once built a public transportation system in the Puget Sound area.

"50.1 percent of the Kickakickamish supported the first monorail and 49.9 percent were opposed to it," Edgar said. "Or vice versa. The oral tradition is not good with numbers."

"And neither are King County officials," I said.

"Long before King County officials arrived in the Pacific Northwest," Edgar said, "the Kickakickamish hacked out a system of trails and roads that linked all of their villages with the villages of other tribes in the area. Horses and dogs pulled wagons along these trails."

"That's amazing," I said.

"I have the map and schedule," said Edgar, digging in an old dresser and pulling out an ancient deerskin crudely painted with wagon stops and departure times. Carefully, slowly, Edgar spread the deerskin over his kitchen table and then laid a newspaper copy of the proposed monorail system over the deerskin.

"They are the same," said Edgar. And it was true. The new monorail map perfectly matched the old Kickakickamish deerskin.

"History repeats itself," said Edgar. "And that is what I'm worried about. You see, at first, the Kickakickamish ran their public transportation for goodwill. It was free. But some of the chiefs realized they could make money. So they started to charge, and then they started to overcharge. And then when people started to avoid public transportation, they started to charge people for not using it. They were making money in all the ways they could. And all the other tribes in the area wanted to make all the money. They wanted to have all the power. So they rose up against the Kickakickamish and slaughtered almost all of us. They burned up all of the wagons and killed and ate all of the horses and dogs. It was genocide."

I sat in silence. I understood now why I'd been seeing these violent visions. I'd been touching a part of the past that was quickly becoming a part of the present.

"History repeats itself," Edgar repeated himself. "And whether they build the monorail this time or not, they will keep trying to build it again and again until it's built. These white people keep making the same mistakes with their public transportation placebo. They don't even know if they truly want it or not. The ambivalent paths they have chosen for their trains are haunted with the vengeful ghosts of the Kickakickamish. Even now, some of the ghosts are hurting the tiny little monorail that runs downtown. They stop it from working and laugh at the stupid tourists as they climb down the ladders to the streets. But it's going to be much worse. If these white people build the entire monorail system, the ghosts will tear it to pieces. I think it might be the end of the world."

I shook and wept, stunned by the spiritual power and wisdom of Edgar.

"But whether voters approve or disapprove of the monorail, it may or may not get built," I said. "And we're still going to have a serious traffic problem."

"Remember this," Edgar said. "Solitary drivers deserve their own little hell."

"It's all so confusing, this democracy."

"This is not about democracy," Edgar said. "It's about a public transportation oligarchy."

"What are we going to do?" I asked him.

"You must go to these foolish white people," said Edgar. "And you must tell them they need to be spiritually pure. They must cleanse themselves before they even think about building a monorail. They must renounce all of their possessions and money. They must wear simple clothes and eat simple food. If these white people, these foolish engineers and foolish city council people and this foolish mayor, if they take a vow of poverty and chastity, then maybe the Kickakickamish ghosts will not harm them and their precious monorail."

Edgar told me to go then because he needed his rest. But he told me I had a mission now. He told me my books and movies were insignificant ego trips, just selfish prattle. I must use my stories for the good of the people, he told me, not to make money.

"Go tell the people what they need to know," he said as I left him.

And so now, terrified of the response, I tell this sacred story. I'm not a spiritual person. I'm not a traditional Indian. But I've been given the responsibility of saving Seattle from itself. So, white people, listen to me: If you must build the monorail, and you will build it someday, with or without voter approval, then build it with a good heart, or you will be destroyed and the rest of the world might be destroyed with you.