re: the adventure continues..............

Hello friends, fans, foe and lovers,

here are a couple panorama's from my mum's house. as you can see the sun and son were rising that morning, i got up and out to take some photos. rez life is a different life. i've spent nearly half of this year back on the reserve, the longest amount of time in years. i learned a lot and it was both good and not so good. right now the cherries are ready, we got tomatoes, jalapeno peppers, potatoes, raspberries, black berries, red currents, peach trees and more planted this spring. 

it was a lot of hard work, but it'll be worth it, we only lost 2 raspberry plants, they were pretty small and didn't survive the transplanting, but the other 20 or so did and are 3 feet tall already. i love fresh raspberries and in the coming years we'll have plenty! reconnecting to the reserve and everyone on it has been pretty cool. overall a positive learning experience this year and i'd do it again. i mean, i'll always be connected to our land and people, but having the opportunity to work for the band and live on reserve is something i'd consider. 

there are sacrifices, it wasn't easy, the winter was filled with short days, grey skies and melancholy, but i survived, my mum has a sun lamp so i was turning it on every day. once spring started and the days were getting longer, it was such a relief! in march i was literally ecstatic about the days getting longer, practically jumping up and down over it. i'd sit outside more and breathe in the air. plants coming to life, the earth waking up, it was awesome. 

our seasons seem to be changing faster here in the southern interior, i distinctly remember 4 different seasons, now it seems to be a 5 month winter of grey and cold, a month of spring and then blistering hot summers that are dry and full of smoke from the multitude of wildfires raging across western canada and the united states (we get a lot of smoke from the great basin in washington state, it's climate is a lot like the southern interiors, a continuation of it, and huge fires.) and then it's october and winter starts again. it's crazy weather days and it shows no sign of stopping, and that's something i've noticed in my lifetime, i can't imagine what my kids will have to deal with in theirs. damn.

in the meantime, i've started writing a super natural thriller based on my time here and it will have the Nlaka'pamux language featured in it as well, lot's of it! time to forge new literary genre's, "aboriginal horror." what do you think? 

until next time lovers,

CB. 

ps: click on the photos to see larger versions of them.