I have had four names in my lifetime, and three have been given names. My one chosen name came at the ripe old age of nine, my parents wanting a Euro-American name for me so that I could fit in living in the U.S. This is the story of my name, Kiliii (pronounced ki-Leeeeeeeeeeeee).

My previous given name was passed to me by an elder ages ago. It had reflected upon who I was to a great extent, but years past I had been trying to find a way to get past the cultural associations with that name. So one fine day in the afternoon, the sky opened up, light burst forth, and a door opened for me.

It began when my unofficial longtime mentor Jon Young came to speak at the Village Building Convergence. Helping facilitate at his workshop the next day, Jon and I hung out a bit and he asked about the origin of the my previous moniker. So I told him the story, and he immediately realized that the word in its original aboriginal context was the cry of the sparrowhawk. Then he asked me a few more questions, and said, "We have a grasshopper-eating hawk that lives here, in our land. Its call is 'killy-killy-killy'€. That's your name!"€

Needless to say, I was surprised and embarassed and deeply grateful, but there was something still missing. The way that Jon described that native grasshopper hawk (the American Kestrel), I realized that I had no relationship with it. I would have to go find it and ask it for a name. After all, the gift was probably more the kestrel's to give.

So I went looking. I dove into my field guides and learned about the American Kestrel, then I started looking for them. Suddenly one afternoon I realized that the unidentified bird I had seen last weekend had been a kestrel sitting on a wire. I set off to find it again; In a span of a week, I had seen nine of them, two of them mating pairs. Once I pulled off the side of the road to listen to them call to each other. "Kiii kiii kiii kiii kiii", then "Aii! aiii aiii"€.

I started to get to know that bird, and the more I watched it, the more it let me know about it. Finally, I heard it call out a satisfying, "E-Leeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee, Eleeeeeeeeeee!"

I took my new name cautiously. It was a gift from an elder (which one does not refuse), it is a story, it is a power in the form of a sound, and I will continue to listen to what Kestrel has to say to me.