HEART DEEP INTO HARVEST

Shell River in N. Minnesota

This past spring many, so many seeds were planted, tucked into the loamy black earth of these COVID times. Some were well tended through sun and stormy weather. And now heart deep into harvest some of those seeds have borne food. Some are already cycling back to earth... What a joy telling eye to eye with young faces again. What a blessing engaging with present adults heart to heart after all that's been and is still becoming. Old haunts and the landscapes of my youth were revisited. In July I gazed out at Lake Michigan from Juneau Park, the park my Dad played in as a kid (he grew up across the street), where my Grandma Rose strolled as a young woman, as a single mother and then in the role of grandmother my small hand tucked in hers as we noshed on Fiddle Faddle. And present at my back, in my mind were those that walked and tended this shoreline - the Potawatomi people and the complex experiences and relationships borne of European contact which I am still very much learning about now...often this is not the history I was taught in school. In August I was fortunate to stand in solidarity under Indigenous leadership with the Water Protectors who are bravely taking a stand to protect the land and waterways of the north. A story with grave consequences deep in it's unfolding. Much to digest, many lessons learned and so much more to grieve, tend, stand up for. The big messages