There's always a weird duality attending Native events. And for me, they're always bittersweet. But yesterday especially.
It's easy to get annoyed at little kids running around during a public event. But no one really discouraged them. It was nice. There's a weird comfort in knowing they aren't burdened by fully understanding the gravity of some things yet. There's a weird comfort in knowing this is a relatively new thing. Native kids just getting to be kids. But for whatever reason, everyone allowed it. I think we all found a form of comfort in them.
It was as much individual as it was communal. Most people kept to themselves most of the time. But eventually all these strangers, in a relatively small group, poored their hearts out and sobbed together; all in the presence and comfort of our community's children. Some were climing random mounds off to the side, one little girl kept tugging at the dresses of those crying to console them.
The exuded presence of both pride and heartbreak, wrapping into the fissures of the bark, and coiling into the veins of the leaves, and dampening the soil of this small forest clearing, filled with Indigenous women, is unparalleled; with exclusion only to that of simmilarly greif-striken Indigenous women.
I was a bit unsettled at the sheer lack of men, maybe 6 total (in a group of about 30-40). But in it's own way, that was nice too. Probobly helped everyone cry in a bit more comfort.
And before and after all these shed tears; we can laugh; and continue to do so. That's the duality. It's weird to think how we just keep living; but we have to, and we do; Somehow.
After the crying we planted women's plants, we made friends, we made plans, we finished our food, and we all went home.
- Just some of my musings of the mmiwg2s event I went to yesterday. Keep yourself and your loved ones close, everyone.
