Solved!!! EDIT: not quite. see below.

First off, my distro came with Tcl/Tk version 8.4. So when I upgraded, I skipped a step; I was still running tclsh version 8.4 as well. So what I did was remove the tclsh simlink from tclsh8.4, and made a new one from tclsh8.5.

Also of note is that Tk 8.5 comes with all of the widgets that can be themed (which come with Tile). So now that I am running Tcl/Tk 8.5, all of those widgets are available, so I do not need Tile at all.

As far as using Tk 8.5 with python goes, I found a python binding called Tile.py which basically makes the calls in Tile available in Tk. So to use the new widgets and themes, you include Tile, and use them.

I hope my trials have come to some use to others ;D

EDIT: python is still trying to use the old Tk version. Does anyone know how to change this?