33
36" x 36" / acrylic on canvas / $800
|
Throughout my life I have continued to have experiences that have left me feeling as if I did not belong in one place or the other, with one group of people or another. I have searched for the place in which I felt comfortable and for the people with whom I could feel as if I belonged. What I have come to understand or believe is that I belong not in one place or the other, not with one group of people or the other. I belong and have purpose in the places in between and in the places which bridge two sides together. I am of the Borderlands. The desire to understand my own place and purpose has led me on a path of study, for which I feel immense gratitude. I continue to be amazed and in awe of the connection and the sacredness between all things. Although the Story is personal, I believe that it is a story for us all. When I say all, I do not mean only those of us who stand on two legs and are called human. This is a story about connections and the relationships between all things. We are all part of the web, and where the strands connect there needs to be something that holds them together.
My Story begins with how I received my name and the physical location of my birth. The birth of the physical body that currently houses my spirit occurred on September 10, 1970. On the day of my arrival, I entered this world with eyes that were purple in color. It was for this reason that my mother decided to name me after the small purplish pink flowers that originally grew in the soil of England and Scotland. I was to be called Heather. Although I am told that my eyes began to fade upon my entry and awakening into this world, their Story would come to serve as a constant reminder and call. Throughout my journey, I would remember the Story of my name. I would wonder about the meaning and purpose held within the purple color of my eyes. By birth and or by blood, I carried a sense of awe, wonder and beauty for the Holy and the Sacred. As have we all, and as we shall again when this part of our soul’s journey has come to an end; I had made the crossing from one world to another. I had come through the Borderlands. I have also come to believe that the presence of my purple eyes at birth were a physical manifestation of remembering the source from which I had come. It was not until I started researching and studying my ancestry, indigenous cultures and shamanism would it feel like I was beginning to touch the edges of understanding regarding my purpose. It was not until I searched and searched and began collecting and weaving together my own Story did I come to wonder about being born with purple eyes that faded upon entry and contact with this world. |
33
Detail I
Detail II
|
The geographical location of my entry into this world occurred in the Northeast Kingdom of Vermont, on the land of my Abenaki ancestors, N’a Dakkina. A land now called Newport.
New - Port
It is a beautiful and rustic land that has produced and supported many generations of my family. Newport is located in the upper northeast area of Vermont and is a border town between the United States and Canada. As a child, the reality of a Borderland was present every day. The land that my parents had chosen to settle on was less than a mile from the Canadian border. The Border Patrol authorities often parked halfway up the hill that led to my childhood home. Their daily presence served as a reminder of the marked distinction between the two worlds and of the societal need or desire to guard the border from unlawful crossings or transports.
As a child I roamed freely through the land that surrounded our home. I spent many hours exploring the woods, open meadows, fields and shorelines of Lake Memphremagog. This natural landscape was my playground, a true friend, a valued teacher, and a source of nourishment. Large and impressive stones and rocks were far more than they appeared; they were magnificent stone alters which could serve as a forest princess’s bed or an imaginary cooking hearth that fed the community of animals and people that I imagined I served. Even the mud that remained after a rainstorm was a glorious gift that could be molded and shaped into a number of objects and magical concoctions. My child’s hands reached deep into the earth to connect with its rich fertile substance.
I would spend hours in the woods in conversation with the trees. When I was small, I believed that their whispers and voice were what created the wind. My child’s imagination and way of looking and listening to the world around me led me to the conclusion that when the trees spoke to each other, their breath moved across the landscape and became the wind. You can imagine my confusion and disbelief when I entered the world of formal schooling and was told that this was definitely not the way that the world worked. In this world, trees did not speak and their voices did not carry across the land.
What did this mean in regards to the hours and hours that I had spent lying in my back on the Earth? Hours spent attempting to blow sticky milkweed seeds into the air so that I could see and feel my breath joining with the trees and dancing across the hills, lake and fields. Did this mean that I could no longer tell how the natural world was feeling? Did it mean that I did not have the ability to communicate with the animals, birds, trees and the magical creatures that I had previously thought waited for me around forested knolls and tree trunks? What of the clouds and the sky? Were they really just things that reacted to a set or series of events with no thought or feeling of their own? Did this new way of learning and thinking mean that I was separate and alone, without the creatures and life forms with whom I had started my life and with whom I had come to know as intimate friends?
Yes, the beginning of my “formal” education marked a period of mourning for me. For surely I did not wish to be ignorant and childish about the ways of the world. I loved learning. Just as I had soaked up the teachings of the natural world, I had a hunger to understand the lessons and thoughts of my new teachers and the different world that I was being exposed to. These teachers were the people who were supposed to show me how it all worked and how it all fit together. Every morning as I put on my Catholic school girl uniform and traveled out of the rural countryside into town, I made the transition from a child of nature to a child of book learning and a child of a Catholic God. The mourning that I spoke of came as a result of attempting to integrate both of these worlds or realities. I mourned my loss of innocence and my inability to feel as if all of me could be present in both of the worlds that I inhabited. Although I found myself in the sweeping and vast arms of the Catholic religion, I began to feel as if I needed to sacrifice my connection to the source of my creativity in order to inhabit the world that I presently found myself in.
In wandering the land of my childhood it was natural, even unavoidable, to accidentally cross over the border into another country. While heavily entranced and walking through the woods of forested magic, I would find myself coming to a section of the woods which had been clear cut. This strip of stumps and ravaged woods had been created to clearly demonstrate that one country or world was being excited and another was being entered. I also knew that underneath the Earth there had been sensors planted that alerted the appropriate authorities that someone was attempting to cross that line without declaring their intentions. Every day when I walked out the front door of my home and looked out over the lake, I saw an island which also had the same distinctive mark. A strip which was clear cut down the middle showing that one half of the water encircled land belonged to Canada and one to the United States.
Just as the land and the waters had been marked to remind me that more than one way of living and being in the world existed, the form of education that I was receiving had begun to demonstrate and echo the same lesson. There are different ways of being in and experiencing the world. It seemed to me that people and forces were extremely intent on making sure that these different ways did not commingle and coincide. Instead, I often felt that they were in opposition and their “sides” needed to be made very clear and that they had to be guarded, alarmed and have knowledge of what the other side was doing or how it was trying to do it.
But what of those like myself? What of those who by the nature of their existence and location, naturally or unknowingly crossed through the veils and borders without knowing or understanding the “proper” way to do so? Was there a place for people who by the very nature of their being existed in both or multiple worlds? This was and is a question that has permeated my life. As you will see, the layers of duality regarding division between worlds and the creation of a world or way of being as a result of these lines of demarcation is the truth of my Story.
The geographical distinction and division of the land was also a reminder of my mixed ancestral heritage. My father’s heritage was French Canadian and European and my mother is of French Canadian, European and Native American descent. The majority of my childhood was spent in a home that practiced Catholicism and openly demonstrated and celebrated its French Canadian ancestry. My Native American ancestry was not as present and was far more of a mystery to me than that of my European heritage.
I have memories of myself as a child in which I am sitting on the floor of our living room and I am watching an old black and white movie on the television. The show that I am watching is a classic “cowboys and Indians”. I remember wondering why all of the Indians looked like their faces are painted with makeup and not realizing that the actors were actually white. I also remember tears falling from my eyes onto my cheeks as I wanted the Indians to win – just once. The tears also came from a place that was harder to identify or explain and often left me with a feeling of being lost or of wandering in a world in which I did not feel as if I belonged. Something in those movies did not feel right. It did not feel like the truth. What really happened, I wondered? Where are they now and why could I not know them. I used to wish that I had been born in the time when Indians lived on the land. I felt sure that I would have found a place in which I belonged and where the trees could still whisper to me. It is no small piece of irony that as these thoughts swirled and mingled in my head, ancestral blood was pumping through my veins and genetic memory was working its magic on my cells and heart.
Periodically throughout my childhood and adult life my mother turned to her Abenaki heritage. She was the first person to take me to a Pow Wow and she is the one who had my medicine bag and honoring feather made for me. Although pieces of this heritage would float to the surface, my mother kept much of her thoughts and beliefs regarding this aspect of her ancestry to herself. It was shared in subtle ways: such as in her connection to the natural world, or in her respect for others ways of being. On the rare occasion that she did speak about it, I was always left with a longing for more and the feeling that I had just touched upon something that was essential to my being. Although the contact between Vermont’s indigenous culture and the Europeans who settled in this area of Vermont had happened long ago, the Borderland that had been created by the contact still existed. My mother carried on in much the same way that her Abenaki grandfather had done before her. Silence had become safety and the creation of the Borderland had caused doubt about which world was the right one to belong to. They were the people who existed as a result of the meeting of the two worlds. Not of one place or the other, but of both and of the place in between. It was not until my son was born that I actively began seeking information and education regarding my Native American ancestry.
As a child I roamed freely through the land that surrounded our home. I spent many hours exploring the woods, open meadows, fields and shorelines of Lake Memphremagog. This natural landscape was my playground, a true friend, a valued teacher, and a source of nourishment. Large and impressive stones and rocks were far more than they appeared; they were magnificent stone alters which could serve as a forest princess’s bed or an imaginary cooking hearth that fed the community of animals and people that I imagined I served. Even the mud that remained after a rainstorm was a glorious gift that could be molded and shaped into a number of objects and magical concoctions. My child’s hands reached deep into the earth to connect with its rich fertile substance.
I would spend hours in the woods in conversation with the trees. When I was small, I believed that their whispers and voice were what created the wind. My child’s imagination and way of looking and listening to the world around me led me to the conclusion that when the trees spoke to each other, their breath moved across the landscape and became the wind. You can imagine my confusion and disbelief when I entered the world of formal schooling and was told that this was definitely not the way that the world worked. In this world, trees did not speak and their voices did not carry across the land.
What did this mean in regards to the hours and hours that I had spent lying in my back on the Earth? Hours spent attempting to blow sticky milkweed seeds into the air so that I could see and feel my breath joining with the trees and dancing across the hills, lake and fields. Did this mean that I could no longer tell how the natural world was feeling? Did it mean that I did not have the ability to communicate with the animals, birds, trees and the magical creatures that I had previously thought waited for me around forested knolls and tree trunks? What of the clouds and the sky? Were they really just things that reacted to a set or series of events with no thought or feeling of their own? Did this new way of learning and thinking mean that I was separate and alone, without the creatures and life forms with whom I had started my life and with whom I had come to know as intimate friends?
Yes, the beginning of my “formal” education marked a period of mourning for me. For surely I did not wish to be ignorant and childish about the ways of the world. I loved learning. Just as I had soaked up the teachings of the natural world, I had a hunger to understand the lessons and thoughts of my new teachers and the different world that I was being exposed to. These teachers were the people who were supposed to show me how it all worked and how it all fit together. Every morning as I put on my Catholic school girl uniform and traveled out of the rural countryside into town, I made the transition from a child of nature to a child of book learning and a child of a Catholic God. The mourning that I spoke of came as a result of attempting to integrate both of these worlds or realities. I mourned my loss of innocence and my inability to feel as if all of me could be present in both of the worlds that I inhabited. Although I found myself in the sweeping and vast arms of the Catholic religion, I began to feel as if I needed to sacrifice my connection to the source of my creativity in order to inhabit the world that I presently found myself in.
In wandering the land of my childhood it was natural, even unavoidable, to accidentally cross over the border into another country. While heavily entranced and walking through the woods of forested magic, I would find myself coming to a section of the woods which had been clear cut. This strip of stumps and ravaged woods had been created to clearly demonstrate that one country or world was being excited and another was being entered. I also knew that underneath the Earth there had been sensors planted that alerted the appropriate authorities that someone was attempting to cross that line without declaring their intentions. Every day when I walked out the front door of my home and looked out over the lake, I saw an island which also had the same distinctive mark. A strip which was clear cut down the middle showing that one half of the water encircled land belonged to Canada and one to the United States.
Just as the land and the waters had been marked to remind me that more than one way of living and being in the world existed, the form of education that I was receiving had begun to demonstrate and echo the same lesson. There are different ways of being in and experiencing the world. It seemed to me that people and forces were extremely intent on making sure that these different ways did not commingle and coincide. Instead, I often felt that they were in opposition and their “sides” needed to be made very clear and that they had to be guarded, alarmed and have knowledge of what the other side was doing or how it was trying to do it.
But what of those like myself? What of those who by the nature of their existence and location, naturally or unknowingly crossed through the veils and borders without knowing or understanding the “proper” way to do so? Was there a place for people who by the very nature of their being existed in both or multiple worlds? This was and is a question that has permeated my life. As you will see, the layers of duality regarding division between worlds and the creation of a world or way of being as a result of these lines of demarcation is the truth of my Story.
The geographical distinction and division of the land was also a reminder of my mixed ancestral heritage. My father’s heritage was French Canadian and European and my mother is of French Canadian, European and Native American descent. The majority of my childhood was spent in a home that practiced Catholicism and openly demonstrated and celebrated its French Canadian ancestry. My Native American ancestry was not as present and was far more of a mystery to me than that of my European heritage.
I have memories of myself as a child in which I am sitting on the floor of our living room and I am watching an old black and white movie on the television. The show that I am watching is a classic “cowboys and Indians”. I remember wondering why all of the Indians looked like their faces are painted with makeup and not realizing that the actors were actually white. I also remember tears falling from my eyes onto my cheeks as I wanted the Indians to win – just once. The tears also came from a place that was harder to identify or explain and often left me with a feeling of being lost or of wandering in a world in which I did not feel as if I belonged. Something in those movies did not feel right. It did not feel like the truth. What really happened, I wondered? Where are they now and why could I not know them. I used to wish that I had been born in the time when Indians lived on the land. I felt sure that I would have found a place in which I belonged and where the trees could still whisper to me. It is no small piece of irony that as these thoughts swirled and mingled in my head, ancestral blood was pumping through my veins and genetic memory was working its magic on my cells and heart.
Periodically throughout my childhood and adult life my mother turned to her Abenaki heritage. She was the first person to take me to a Pow Wow and she is the one who had my medicine bag and honoring feather made for me. Although pieces of this heritage would float to the surface, my mother kept much of her thoughts and beliefs regarding this aspect of her ancestry to herself. It was shared in subtle ways: such as in her connection to the natural world, or in her respect for others ways of being. On the rare occasion that she did speak about it, I was always left with a longing for more and the feeling that I had just touched upon something that was essential to my being. Although the contact between Vermont’s indigenous culture and the Europeans who settled in this area of Vermont had happened long ago, the Borderland that had been created by the contact still existed. My mother carried on in much the same way that her Abenaki grandfather had done before her. Silence had become safety and the creation of the Borderland had caused doubt about which world was the right one to belong to. They were the people who existed as a result of the meeting of the two worlds. Not of one place or the other, but of both and of the place in between. It was not until my son was born that I actively began seeking information and education regarding my Native American ancestry.
Every family gives birth to their own Medicine Women.
