by Peter Twitchell
Today I am grateful to be 72 years of age only by the grace of Almighty Creator God am I able to share this with you.
It’s like I told my healthcare provider, the doctor who takes care of my medical needs, “You’ve been my personal physician for 18 years now,” when I thanked him for being my doctor and taking care of my medical needs. He told me, “It’s all you Peter, it’s what you’ve done!”
I guess being human I argued with the fine doctor. I said, “I give you 50% credit. This is a 50-50 partnership, you are the doctor and I am the patient.”
I have trusted this doctor with my life, the same as I have trusted Jesus Christ of Nazareth who created me. I am also very grateful for all my Elders of past when I was young when I needed their guidance in how to be a man, a human being.
The doctor has made all my professional referrals to other professional doctors to perform tests upon tests and prescribe medicines I needed to improve my health. I finally felt like I expressed my true feelings when I told this doctor what I felt and how much I appreciated him.
When KYUK radio signed on in 1971 I was fortunate enough to be referred by our superintendent at the Kilbuck school, Maxwell Fancher, to KYUK because he felt I could speak the Yup’ik language of southwest Alaska!
It was difficult to be fluent in my own language from the beginning but I finally felt comfortable after working with Elders throughout my career at KYUK radio station. I loved working with the elders of the Yukon/Kuskokwim – the tundra, the coastal, and Nunivak Island.
I worked with Elders for the radio station in KYUK Bethel, Alaska for 24 years earning my state of Alaska traditional counselor license good for life.
This really helped me to enter into the human service program of the University of Alaska Fairbanks and the Kuskokwim community college from 1996 to 1998.
One of our Elders from the coast came to Bethel to spend a week with our 26 student human services program and talked about alcohol which was killing our people!
The Elder spoke fluently our language and told our group of 26 future human services workers in training, and this is what was shared.
The Elder said, “Whenever we put the contents of an alcohol bottle into our mouth we kiss Lucifer, Satan, which ever you want to call him. We kiss the devil and swallow him into our belly and he laughs!”
I never forgot this statement our Elder spoke that day to 26 of us Human services workers trainees and our sponsors.
