Connection and history

 My people, for whatever that means, are not native to this place. For whatever native means. My family traces its roots to Ireland, which means we're white. They came to North America, and here, a few generations ago, displacing the people who lived here. I know shockingly little about it. Our history museum in town, beyond a few arrowheads, has nothing on the people here before us. They were displaced so thoroughly, that I don't know anyone, see any remnants.

I spend quite a bit of time wondering what it means that my people aren't native here. I know it matters to the people that we displaced. I'm not trying to dismiss that or belittle it, or claim it's not my issue or responsibility. But when I'm thinking about connecting to the land, to where I live, right now, I'm not sure how it matters. 

I don't have a clear idea of how to connect to this land. The Dakota Sioux would have had traditions and knowledge and rituals that matched this place, built and improved over time. Those aren't mine to use. Pat ?? uses the analogy of climbing a mountain. If you belong to a group that has time-worn ways, you have a path. If not, you've got to forge your own, which will be slower, and less direct, and occasionally dangerous. But you can still get to the top of the mountain if you want to. 

So in that sense, I imagine that the land prefers the easy connection of someone who has the tools to do it well. And that's not me. But does the land actually care that my people have only been here for five generations? Because the Dakota displaced the people before them. Maybe they were here for 50 generations - is that a salient difference to a landform billions of years old? Life is mobile, and always has been. I don't think the earth uses any one time as the reference, the Right Time, after which any changes are less valid. 

Does this absolve Europeans from stealing this land, and mistreating and killing the people here before us? No. But it does mean that I shouldn't think of my family's short time in this place as a reason that I can't connect, or don't belong.