By Roni Jo Draper
My father was born and raised in the Yurok village of Weitpus, in what is now considered Northern California. There at the fork of the Klamath and Trinity Rivers, he fished, gathered acorns with his gram, and put fire on the ground so she would have the material she needed for her baskets. Aawok Lucinda, my great grandmother, was a master basket weaver. As a child I listened to my father tell me stories of her baskets and we visited them when they were on display at the California Academy of Sciences at the Golden Gate Park in San Francisco. I took my children on a similar tour and told similar stories.
I never met my great-grandmother - she left this world just as I entered. Sometimes I try to imagine her life on the river, gathering hazel and willow, and spending her days weaving and visiting (no doubt laughing) with her sister. Aawok Lucinda saw all her children taken to the Sherman Indian Boarding School in Riverside, California. They all, thankfully, returned - carrying trauma with them. Like many Native people swept up in the shameful legacy of boarding schools, my grandmother and her siblings did not talk about their experiences at Sherman. But their lives revealed evidence of their ability to survive in a world that explicitly tried to erase them.
I wish I could ask Aawok Lucinda about the experience of watching her children leave and return. I would like to know how she dealt with the sorrow of their absence and the joy of their return. I would also like to know about Aawok Norma's experiences. I would like to understand what she faced, so I could bear witness to her suffering and her strength. I can bear witness to her survival and the way that she managed to cope and bring my father and his beautiful siblings into the world. I cannot say that she thrived in this world, but I know she loved mightily and laughed boldly - traits I endeavor to carry well today.
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By Roni Jo Draper
