As a young man, Lee Obizaan Staples learned how to conduct an Ojibwe funeral from his elders at Aazhoomog (Lake Lena) on the reservation of Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe in Minnesota. Since 1995, he has answered the call of the tobacco that always seems to find him and never seems to cease.
 
"The reason why I am having this written down is that in the future there are going to be fewer people who know how to send the Anishinaabe spirit to that other world,"he says. "It is meant to be shared so there are others in the future who can carry on these teachings."