Subject: owls
From: carey@uxc.cso.uiuc.edu (John Carey)
Date: 1990-10-05, 08:46
Newsgroups: alt.tv.twin-peaks

At the video store I ran into a movie called "the owl called my name".
Tom Courtenay is a catholic priest/missionary in a small Indian village
in British Columbia.  (This is about present-day British Columbia,
and the chief is just an ordinary looking old man)

The scene where they talk about owls...

Chief rowing a boat in the sea, TC sits in front of boat, Chief tries
to teach TC some indian words...
Chief--(says indian word for raven)
TC--What is that?
Chief--They say the an old chief kept the sun in a box.  The raven
stole the sun from the box and put it in the sky for all of us to see.
And the owl...
TC--the owl calls your name when you are ready to die.
Chief--Yes.  In the old days, when a child died, the mother would 
kick the body three times, saying, "Don't look back, don't turn your
head, walk straight on, for you are going to the land of the owls."
Most of our legends are about death.  It is something we know about.