This is probably one of the most devastating books I've ever read. Reading about Robin Wall Kimmerer's love for and connection with the land is so bittersweet. I'm deeply glad that there are people like her out there who care so much for the world like this, but I also mourn that I will never be one of them. I desperately want to feel this relationship of reciprocity, but when I'm actually outside in nature, these concepts feel so alien. I love nature, it's incredibly beautiful and important to me, but I don't think that I will ever truly believe that the land loves me back.

Maybe part of it is this "species loneliness" that I definitely have experienced and maybe some of it is that I am a settler where I live (I do think that I feel more comfortable in my birthplace of England), but I think that most of it is that I lack the spirituality needed to fully understand this relationship. I've been an atheist my whole life, so while I can accept that plants, animals, and even rocks are alive and sovereign beings, I cannot find it in myself to believe that our relationship has any deeper, spiritual purpose beyond mutual survival. Either way, I want to keep trying. Even if I never achieve this mutual relationship that Robin Wall Kimmerer does, my own love for the land is enough of a reason to care for it and protect it.

It's very difficult living in Quebec nowadays while caring about the environment, literally nobody else seems to give a singular fuck and it's so disheartening. Everyday, the main topic on anybody's mind is the French vs English debate. I'm so exhausted of seeing people come onto the public stage and complain about French "dying out" or "being replaced by English" when none of them would ever so much as lift a finger for Indigenous language preservation, the ACTUAL languages that are under threat here. It's so fucking hypocritical and exhausting, especially after this month's election (where the man elected is a staunch francisation supporter who wants to implement extreme (and also very anti-immigrant & racist) laws to prevent people from attending school in English despite HIMSELF ATTENDING UNIVERSITY IN ENGLISH!).

All of my courses have land acknowlegements at the beginning and we learn about Indigenous history and persepectives in our classes, but none of it actually helps the real, living Indigenous people in our province. Indigenous people are still the most disenfranchised and vulnerable population, their reserves often don't have running water, or electricity, or even groceries and they have next to no political represention or power. In fact, the mere existence of "reservations" is a form of apartheid and segregation, but no one ever talks about that either… I truly don't know whether or not I agree with Kimmerer that it's possible for the descendents of settlers to ever "become Indigenous" to Turtle Island, but I'm deeply thankful that she does. It gives me a little bit of much needed hope right now.

Edit: In the past few days, our new PM has refused to attend the national conference with Indigenous leaders that discussed abolishing the incredibly racist "Indian Act" that EVERY OTHER PROVINCIAL LEADER ATTENDED I'm so fucking tired 🫩