Natives
by M.J. Damewood
Portland, OR
We call ourselves Natives. With no clear definition of what makes us so. We’ve been here longer than you. Can remember when that corner used to be this and when that strip mall used to be a meadow. There is a compulsion that motivates our fervent pride. We are the keepers of the stories of this land. And we believe that these stories matter. We may resist perpetual progress and resent certain immigration. But we know. We know that it is inevitable. We are those that hope for a bitter and wet February, a February that drives doubt and despair into our core. Maniacally we let it mingle within, creating even more native. It is our tradeoff, our penance, for being allowed to take from this land. This land that will call all those who seek majesty and wonder to her.
My native comes from the north. A French Canadian fur trapper who settled the Willamette Valley with a Blackfoot bride. They called for a priest. Father Blanchett re-married Joseph DeLore and Mani Luzahn in the first Catholic parish in the Oregon Territory. Settlers followed and my family is moved east. Imprinting sagebrush and hot springs and open skies into my bones. The west is home, our first home. The east is our retreat. Stories – insignificant and triumphant. Wounds garnered in the belly of Oregon’s past are not easily healed; they linger in our ‘nativeness’. Further proof of our sacrifice for this place.
We carry these stories. We gather them to us for within them are the hopes of our past. For we are blessed all that live in this land, this Oregon.
