Stories of Our Mi'kmaq Family

I began to write this book many times, but each time I used the voice of who I was that day that I was writing instead of where I came from: middle child of a large extended family of Micmac Indians in rural southern Maine in the fifties. But sometimes I do revert to the language of my family; their speech and familiar sayings that were influenced by their roots.

Route One in those days was two lanes of large square slabs of concrete that had a lavender hue. It was a quiet, lazy stretch that I would often visualize as winding down past my house all the way to the bottom of Florida until it could go no more. All along our quiet road stood large climbable billboards. The one across the street from our house had elephants and bears and other exotic animals that the sign told you to go and visit at the York Animal Forest south of us. There was a woods beyond the billboard with grassy fields inside where my older brother and his friends would go. So much time has passed. So much has happened.

I have lived my years as an Indian searching for some connection with my people. At fifty I finally arrived at a place where I had a connection, and now I don’t know if I want one. My great aunts were sharp tongued and closed-mouthed when it came to the reserve they lived on in Canada. Not one of them ever told us the name of the reserve was Acadia. They didn’t tell anyone why they left the reserve; didn’t talk about the poverty or the prejudice. I remember asking questions, but what I got for answers as a young child were cryptic. I was made to believe that the things Aunt Lou did were magical, secret. I heard she went out into the woods during new moons. I was told that she made rain, an idea I found weirdly stereotypical. The other aunts really believed she made rain, and they even tried to do it later when she had gone on. But there was no fire or big block of ice, so they used a stove and ice cubes.

One thing I always cherished was that we spent so much of our time outdoors. My great grandmother and great grandfather built several houses all around Arundel where they settled their family. We’d eat outside and sleep there and gather. And other Mi’kmaqs came from the reserve in Nova Scotia to stay out in the small abode at the Gravel Pit where different family members lived from time to time, including my mother. I love those memories. I found out several years ago that one of the Pictou boys who always visited us from Nova Scotia went with his folks to a harvest celebration out at Blueberry Plains in Sanford each fall, with drum and dancing, and wondered why I had not known. I just knew that Lil and John Pictou and their boys came by the house each year. I wonder why no one told us about the gatherings or if they didn’t want to be involved, or maybe they were involved but just didn’t tell us kids. It hurts me because I’m pretty sure everybody knew I was interested in our being Micmacs. I waited my whole life to have knowledge of the people I came from.

My sister went up there to Yarmouth with her husband several years ago. They had a nice visit with the relatives there, but when my sister thought she might like to see the reserve, our elder relative told her she wouldn’t want to go there. So Anne came back never having gone to Acadia. My Uncle Bob and I went in 2000, and loved the experience, which I have already written about in this blog. This month my brother and sister are taking our elder Uncle Joe up there to see Elsie Basque and the Acadia Reserve. I hope to write about that when they get back.