For The Wild - LINDA BLACK ELK on What Endures After Pandemic ⧸171

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00:00:30.000 Hello, and welcome to For the Wild podcast.

00:00:37.600 I'm Ayanna Young.

00:00:39.260 Today, I'll be speaking with Linda Black Elk from the Catawba Nation.

00:00:44.600 I mean, I hate to say it this way, but maybe if we'd shown greater respect for the micro,

00:00:49.600 we wouldn't be dealing with a pandemic virus right now.

00:00:52.880 So I think that restoration ecology can sort of be a guide for how we relate to the planet or how we relate to our Mother Earth in the future.

00:01:06.320 First listening and understanding and developing a relationship and then looking at ways that we can actually rebuild and restore and experiment.

00:01:16.780 Linda is an ethnobotanist specializing in traditional foods and medicines of the Great

00:01:25.860 Plains. She is currently the Director of Food Sovereignty at United Tribes Technical College

00:01:31.700 in Bismarck, North Dakota, and is the mother of Three Lakota Sons.

00:01:38.380 Well, Linda, thank you so much for joining us today. Like I was mentioning, this is a dream

00:01:44.860 come true for me to be speaking with you. I have so much respect and I feel so connected

00:01:48.960 to your work and the way that you go about your work in this world. So thank you for joining us.

00:01:57.800 Well, thank you so much for having me. I'm so excited. I've listened to your podcast before

00:02:02.000 and I love it. So I'm really honored to be on here.

00:02:05.560 Oh, wow. Okay. Well, you just made my day. So Linda, of course, I have to begin by asking

00:02:12.800 about the use of traditional medicine right now when it comes to community wellness.

00:02:17.440 And I know so many of us are taking time to take care and sourcing practices that can

00:02:23.960 boost our immune systems through ancestral medicine, nourishing meals, being in prayer,

00:02:29.100 acting in service to elders, and even just taking a moment to lay in the sun.

00:02:34.640 And as a practitioner, I'm wondering if you could share some of the most important things

00:02:38.940 you are doing to take care right now.

00:02:40.580 oh gosh yeah it's a really tough time to practice self-care right now we're all really stressed

00:02:48.640 and stress and anxiety of course lower our immune systems and so I would say that probably the best

00:02:56.280 thing I'm doing for myself and my family the ones that I am isolating with is to laugh and to keep

00:03:04.680 our stress levels down to talk to each other, to joke around with each other, keep our anxiety

00:03:11.280 levels low so that our immune systems can keep repairing themselves. So that's probably the

00:03:17.920 most important thing is just to make sure that we are doing things to allow ourselves to enjoy

00:03:25.320 the moment, enjoy this time with our families while still remaining aware of what's happening

00:03:31.800 in the outside world. It's a tough thing to do, but we can do it. The other thing, and I would

00:03:37.380 say that it's probably equally important, is that I'm making sure to eat right. What does that mean

00:03:44.560 to eat right? Because some people would probably say that eating right is just a matter of getting

00:03:50.820 enough calories in your system. And there is no food shaming here. If people only have access to

00:03:58.020 processed foods you know things that are high in salt and sugar and preservatives then that's all

00:04:03.340 they have access to and you know i honor them and their journey and you know whatever food they need

00:04:09.780 to eat but if they have access if we have access to foods that don't just nourish us physically

00:04:17.160 don't just provide calories but also feed us emotionally and mentally and spiritually

00:04:24.840 then we should be doing that and it's sort of my mission to help people to be aware

00:04:31.460 of the fact that they probably have some of these foods that nourish them mentally emotionally

00:04:38.640 physically and spiritually growing right outside of their doors and they're free so that's always

00:04:45.420 really important to my community which is indigenous people of the northern great plains

00:04:52.020 but you know anyone else who needs that I believe healing is for everyone so yeah so I'm focusing

00:04:57.800 on staying as happy as possible decreasing stress but also eating good things like the wild plants

00:05:06.040 which of course are not just edible but medicinal as well I'm focusing on a lot of fermented foods

00:05:12.700 like kimchi and sauerkraut I'm not a huge fan of kombucha which has become a very popular

00:05:20.100 probiotic these days, but I love vinegars, various fermented vinegars like maple vinegar,

00:05:26.740 and I'm incorporating a lot of those into my diet. And I'm trying to, as much as possible,

00:05:32.020 even though I don't believe in sort of preaching elimination diets, I'm trying to decrease the

00:05:39.360 amount of sugar I eat, the amount of refined sugar I eat. I'm trying to decrease the amount

00:05:45.360 of refined flour in my diet. And I'm always trying to decrease the amount of dairy in my diet.

00:05:52.020 Now, as I was saying earlier, I love to laugh and I love joy. And sometimes that means eating

00:05:57.640 cheese for me, or it means eating bacon, or it means eating some brownies. It's just a matter

00:06:04.020 of finding that balance between what is good for your body, what's good to eat, what you have access

00:06:10.080 to and what is going to help you stay as happy and connected as possible.

00:06:15.960 Oh my goodness, Linda, bacon, cheese, and brownies. Yes, please. That also brings me joy.

00:06:22.300 So thank you for those reminders. I think that in times of crisis, we can forget

00:06:27.960 these simple reminders of taking care in these ways of eating and laughing and they feel really

00:06:34.480 important right now. And yeah, it's just undeniable that we are navigating this great

00:06:40.920 unknown when it comes to what we do. And we don't know all the details of COVID-19. So I'd like to

00:06:47.880 talk a little bit about the debate that is going on around different plant medicines and whether

00:06:52.500 or not they should be recommended. Obviously, we know that there is no official designated cure

00:06:59.620 or preventative measures. But that being said, we can't just turn our backs on the medicines that

00:07:05.360 have been in use since time immemorial. So I'd love if you could share with us what it means to

00:07:11.020 practice plant medicine during times of urgency, and how can we balance our reliance on plant

00:07:17.480 medicine while preventing the potential misuse of this medicine during this time?

00:07:23.020 This is such a great question.

00:07:25.400 So I think that one of the, dare I say, faults of Western medicine is that it is always trying

00:07:33.180 to look for the cure.

00:07:35.640 Western medicine is always trying to look for the magic bullet, the thing that will

00:07:39.720 either keep people from getting sick or the thing that will actually cure an illness.

00:07:44.860 As Indigenous people, we're lucky because Indigenous medicine, traditional medicine,

00:07:49.000 really focuses on the general action of plants. It doesn't focus on this magic bullet. So for

00:07:56.960 example, we've had a lot of discussion recently about elderberry elixir, which is a mixture of

00:08:04.040 medicines actually, that of course includes elderberries and it includes raw honey and

00:08:09.400 beautiful spices like star anise and cinnamon. People put turmeric and echinacea and rose hips

00:08:16.420 into their elderberry elixir. It's just a beautiful mixture of medicines that boost your

00:08:21.540 immune system and help with cough and respiratory illness. And all of these medicines have a general

00:08:28.880 action such as boosting your immune system or such as generally being an antiviral. They're not

00:08:35.220 trying to be a magic bullet. So people can use them in a really good, safe way to just make

00:08:44.560 themselves more able to fight off illness. And I think that those general actions are really

00:08:51.080 important. And I think that that is where Western medicine falls behind. They're not trying to help

00:08:56.800 people be healthier. They are trying to find the magic bullet that will either prevent or cure

00:09:03.020 the illness. So that means that we have to step in early within these epidemics and pandemics

00:09:10.360 as Indigenous people, as we have always done, stepped in to save and to comfort our communities,

00:09:18.040 whether they are our Indigenous brothers and sisters or non-Indigenous community members as

00:09:23.880 well. And I have really found that a lot of the hundreds of messages and requests for advice that

00:09:31.660 I get per day actually come from non-Native people who are just at an absolute loss and who are 1.00

00:09:37.340 scared because they know that Western medicine does not have a way to currently fight or cure

00:09:43.580 a COVID-19 infection. So I'm happy to share that information with them.

00:09:52.000 Thank you so much for being so available, especially during this time. It's troubling

00:09:57.980 and people are really confused and there's so much to be confused about that we'll get into

00:10:03.060 more of that further into the conversation. But by now, I think we're all familiar with

00:10:09.240 the power that perceived scarcity holds, as it has caused millions across the globe to engage

00:10:16.080 in mass hoarding. In response, many are cultivating self-resilience by turning to traditional medicines

00:10:22.340 and personal gardens. However, I've noticed that the hoarding mentality reigns supreme in many of

00:10:28.980 these well-intentioned actions. For example, many seed companies are completely sold out,

00:10:34.660 and medicine like elderberry and bear root or osha root are being harvested at an unhealthy rate.

00:10:42.020 So I can't help but think about how we remain trapped within the psychological confines of

00:10:48.000 unbridled capitalism that even when we seek out so-called alternative ways of being,

00:10:54.020 we continue to reenact selfish behavior in our harvesting, foraging, growing, et cetera.

00:11:00.540 So I'd love if you could share with us how this behavior is diametrically opposed to being in

00:11:07.180 relation with earth or perhaps any guidance on practicing honorable harvest amidst times of

00:11:13.320 panic. So I've been dealing with this a lot lately and, you know, I try to harvest as much

00:11:20.140 of my own medicines as possible so that I can come in physical and spiritual contact with my

00:11:25.740 plant relatives, talk to them, talk to them about why I'm harvesting them and how they're going to

00:11:31.480 be applied. And I feel like that always helps. But as an individual, there's just no way that

00:11:38.720 I can harvest enough for everyone that I want to help. So I do contact various people, friends of

00:11:45.180 mine who might have stuff available, who might have medicines available. And a lot of them are

00:11:51.340 struggling right now with having enough to meet the demand. It's important to remember that there's

00:11:57.000 a difference between hoarding and being prepared, like all that bullshit with the toilet paper and 0.96

00:12:03.520 processed high carb foods like ramen noodles that I was talking about earlier. People are hoarding 0.96

00:12:09.320 those items, making sure that you and your community, and let me stress the and there,

00:12:14.640 making sure that you and your community have what they need, that's vital because we won't

00:12:20.080 make it through this on our own. Being in quarantine doesn't mean that we can't take

00:12:24.420 care of each other. The key, I think, to fighting this hoarding mentality is the opposite of hoarding,

00:12:30.960 which is sharing. And I believe healing is for everyone and that we have to trust our relatives,

00:12:37.320 native and non-native, in these times of crises. I remember, as you know, I was very involved down

00:12:43.660 at Standing Rock in the camps fighting the Dakota Access Pipeline. And I remember after I came

00:12:49.580 through all of that, even though I had been pepper sprayed 12 times, even though I had been shot with

00:12:56.400 rubber bullets, even though I had been sprayed with water cannons and sub-zero temperatures,

00:13:01.740 and I had been the victim of this CS, you know, this nerve gas that made me shake all over.

00:13:08.500 Even after all of that, I remember standing there and looking around and thinking to myself

00:13:13.380 that people are generally good. People are good. And I swore to myself, swore to myself that

00:13:19.680 I would never forget that. And that's what I've been trying to remind myself of as I watch the

00:13:25.600 news and I see people hoarding seeds and hoarding traditional medicines and over-harvesting sage

00:13:32.740 because they think that it's going to kill SARS-CoV-2 all around them. And I think a lot of

00:13:39.820 that comes from misinformation and that it requires a large degree of patience on the part of healers

00:13:48.600 and indigenous people in general to encourage sustainability, to encourage sharing and demand,

00:13:56.800 not just encourage, but demand that people follow proper protocols that have been put in place by

00:14:03.200 the people who know this land better than anyone. And that's us, that's native people. We have to

00:14:09.300 believe and encourage common sense. People who are saying ridiculous things about this virus 0.82

00:14:15.320 being a hoax, you know, as our Diné relatives are dying in droves, you know, we need to practice

00:14:21.500 patience, common sense. We need to be teachers in a time when really I'm tired. I get very tired 0.99

00:14:30.120 of having to share and teach. But right now it is more critical than ever that we as Indigenous

00:14:38.720 people are willing to share and demand that other people share and practice common sense and

00:14:45.560 critical thinking and all of that. But there's been a real push over the last few years where

00:14:51.580 my non-Native friends, I'll say it, my white friends have stepped forward for me when people

00:14:58.020 will try to argue with me or say, for example, that this isn't all Native land. You guys lost

00:15:04.980 some war or something. Well, I have this amazing group of non-Native friends who step up and don't 1.00

00:15:12.180 make me try to explain to people why what they're saying is ridiculous. And I really value my friends

00:15:19.200 for doing that because it gives me energy to continue and it gives me energy for times of

00:15:24.780 crisis like this so that I can step up and protect my plant relatives, make sure that people are

00:15:32.720 sharing, make sure that people are following proper protocols, demanding that of them.

00:15:38.300 And it makes a difference. And beyond that, there's really not a whole lot I can do. I can

00:15:43.480 explain, I can teach, and I can encourage, and I can demand. And beyond that, there's just not a

00:15:50.000 lot that I can do. I do not want to be within touching distance of someone who's trying to

00:15:54.760 overharvest sage right now. So all I can do is hope that if I give them the right information,

00:15:59.620 they'll take it and do good things with it. Wow, Linda, your patience and bravery and love,

00:16:10.000 like just so much love that you have for this earth and for all the creatures, including the

00:16:16.960 humans roaming around is unbelievable. Just that you've been able to put yourself on the front

00:16:24.120 lines, your body on the front lines for what was happening at Standing Rock with the pipeline,

00:16:30.380 and also have patience for those who have been doing things that are harmful and still see the

00:16:37.820 good in people. I mean, that is such a practice that, yeah, so challenging. And it's really

00:16:45.200 inspiring to hear you speak to these things with so much care and love. And I don't know,

00:16:52.080 just a feeling of abundance that you are sharing with us is really beautiful.

00:16:57.320 And well, and, you know, I think it's important to also for me to say that it doesn't mean I'm

00:17:02.660 not fearful. You know, I am placing a great amount of trust in people that I have actually

00:17:08.840 been taught to not trust. And one of my friends, her name's Valerie, she's another plant person.

00:17:14.880 And she made a very good point that, you know, she was saying to me as I was making

00:17:20.600 videos and I was on webinars talking about various plant medicines for boosting immunity

00:17:26.860 and fighting infection. And she said, don't ever forget that most of the witch hunts that have

00:17:33.780 taken place have occurred after pandemics. And that was very striking to me because it's true. 1.00

00:17:39.880 It's historically accurate. A lot of times it's the healers after a pandemic who are hunted down

00:17:46.100 and seen as the enemy because of course we provide a service largely for free and we take

00:17:53.880 funds money away from people who are trying to make lots of it and take advantage of people who

00:17:59.840 don't have very much and so that means a lot of times after big illnesses like this we receive

00:18:06.940 a lot of ire I suppose in the eyes particularly of big business and big medicine big pharma so

00:18:15.640 I just wanted to make sure to say that it's not that I'm not fearful in a way for myself and my

00:18:21.620 family and my friends and other healers. It's that I know that providing healing for people

00:18:27.380 is more important than my fear. My goodness, Linda. Wow. Thank you so much for adding that

00:18:33.700 piece. And I didn't know that historical, I'm like slurring because I'm just kind of

00:18:41.880 shocked by that. Maybe shocked isn't the right word, but that was really kind of perked me up

00:18:48.060 to think about that. And it makes a lot of sense, although it's horrible. And I appreciate you

00:18:53.520 saying that. It's important for us to understand the history of other pandemics as we look to the

00:18:59.080 one that we're in so that we can protect ourselves while protecting others. And as we're talking

00:19:05.480 about all of these things and honorable harvesting and growing with reverence and working with the

00:19:10.680 plants and giving and sharing. I can't help but draw upon your work with restoration ecology and

00:19:18.660 the importance of, for example, the life-giving prairies and grasslands. As many of us awaken

00:19:24.800 or reawaken to the value of personal and communal gardening, I want to remind listeners of the

00:19:31.140 importance of cultivating care beyond our immediate place. So I'm wondering if you could talk about

00:19:36.520 the importance of restoration ecology as we make plans for living well, and how is this an act of

00:19:42.580 reciprocity? Wonderful question. Restoration is really in my heart because I look at lands that

00:19:52.460 are sacred, and I look at the ways that various practices, usually as a result of unbridled

00:20:00.740 capitalism have destroyed soil, have destroyed plant life, animal life, have destroyed air

00:20:09.300 quality and water quality. And I do not lose hope when I see that because I have seen

00:20:17.340 restoration take place. I've seen the rebuilding of soil and I've seen water that I thought

00:20:25.720 would forever be undrinkable I've seen that cleaned and you know purified and you know I've

00:20:32.780 seen the same thing happen with the air that we breathe in places and it's really encouraging to

00:20:38.380 me and you know I think the reason I'm able to see that the reason I'm always able to have hope

00:20:43.780 when I see polluted areas is because I know that I have a connection with the plant nations and the

00:20:53.680 animal nations, the other animals that will grow and thrive there. Because the first step to

00:20:59.720 understanding restoration ecology is to develop a relationship with the land. That's absolutely

00:21:04.920 the most important first step. I think there's this mythology when it comes to restoration

00:21:10.420 that we have to take the land back to some indefinable time, maybe back to the 1500s,

00:21:18.680 But oh, no, you know, we were already here as Indigenous people for eons, millennia before that.

00:21:24.440 So where do we take it back to?

00:21:26.060 You know, I think that it's unrealistic to think that we need to restore land back to this immemorial time and that that can actually cause more harm to plant and animal life, cause more harm than good.

00:21:40.360 So what I like to do is to take the approach of communicating with the land.

00:21:45.860 And as an indigenous person, I always hesitate to talk that way because people call me a big hippie when I do. But talking to plants, finding out what they need and where they want to grow and how best to grow them, experimenting with them, listening to them, understanding them, that is restoration ecology.

00:22:03.600 You cannot restore land without listening to the land.

00:22:08.260 You do have to think about, you know, this is something I absolutely know.

00:22:12.140 We have to think about rebuilding soil, restoring soil, air, water, wildlife, so that we can

00:22:18.860 be better future partners to help sustain all life on this planet.

00:22:22.800 We can't just be superficial and plant some trees and walk away and expect things to take

00:22:28.260 care of themselves.

00:22:28.940 we have to consider soil biota first and you know below ground relationships that sustain

00:22:35.420 everything that's above ground we have to show respect and consideration for all organisms i

00:22:42.100 know everyone always tries to think on the macro level you know let's look at these huge beautiful

00:22:46.580 trees and let's look at restoring bison to an area but not many people are thinking about the

00:22:52.460 microscopic organisms and perhaps i mean i hate to say it this way but maybe if we'd shown

00:22:58.700 greater respect for the micro, we wouldn't be dealing with a pandemic virus right now. So I

00:23:04.980 think that restoration ecology can sort of be a guide for how we relate to the planet or how we

00:23:14.360 relate to our mother earth in the future. First listening and understanding and developing a

00:23:20.260 relationship and then looking at ways that we can actually rebuild and restore and experiment

00:23:27.740 mm-hmm your question it answered the heart of the question completely and I really agree with you

00:23:35.960 Linda I've been involved with restoration ecology for the past six seven years now and I've been

00:23:43.960 really disenchanted with the way academic restoration ecology is playing out or this

00:23:51.040 restoration industrial complex like you were saying earlier with these visions of restoring

00:23:57.360 back to a certain time frame 200 years ago, 300 years ago, it doesn't really make sense.

00:24:04.400 We're not looking at what the land is saying right now and building those relationships

00:24:08.520 and listening and trying things out and experimenting and being small and looking at the micro.

00:24:14.660 And I agree, people are much more obsessed with the grandeur of the large trees or they

00:24:23.000 want things to happen really quickly. But I think that's also something that stops us from being in

00:24:28.420 relationship or having consent or trust building. If we want things to be fast and urgent, we just

00:24:33.740 want something that looks degraded to be somehow looking like old growth status within our

00:24:39.480 lifetimes. That's not going to happen. We can't create old growth in a short span of time. It's

00:24:45.760 old growth. I mean, these ecosystems, these lands take so long. And I think for me, getting

00:24:51.620 comfortable with releasing the urgency, not in the sense of releasing care and passion,

00:24:58.600 but just putting things in perspective and putting things in relational perspective is so

00:25:04.360 important for me in my own learning. And so to hear you say what you've said so eloquently,

00:25:11.820 it really helps me personally just stay on this path. And I'm sure so many others will resonate

00:25:18.040 with what you're saying, because I think that what we have been doing in this industrial

00:25:22.940 academic lens or format or way of doing is just not really working. And we're not seeing

00:25:31.740 the earth respond. I don't think, especially when we're just plugging trees into

00:25:37.880 poisoned lands in a monocropped fashion, not really thinking about the whole system,

00:25:44.040 like the biota, like the micro organisms in the soil. It's so important. So I really am

00:25:50.120 very appreciative that you spoke to that. Yeah. So thank you.

00:25:53.260 You know, it helps when we think truly of the planet as our mother, as mother earth,

00:25:58.120 and realize that these degraded or polluted areas are wounds. They are literal wounds on our mother

00:26:06.460 and they are trauma. The healing of trauma is never easy. The healing of wounds is never easy.

00:26:12.820 And sometimes it's a painful process, right?

00:26:15.600 You know, sometimes medicine, when you apply it to a wound, it hurts and it takes time

00:26:20.540 to heal.

00:26:21.120 And sometimes it has to heal from the inside out.

00:26:24.060 And, you know, we need to think of it that way.

00:26:26.380 And we need to think of ourselves as all of us, you know, people who are practicing

00:26:30.740 restoration ecology, especially we need to think of ourselves as healers the same way

00:26:34.980 that, you know, I heal other human beings.

00:26:38.280 You know, I work to heal my mother.

00:26:40.300 and you know that takes a certain amount of patience and it takes a certain amount of

00:26:45.100 tending to these wounds and being patient and you know always trying to comfort her and let her know

00:26:52.620 that it's healing you know there's a lot of trauma just like you know we have trauma historic trauma

00:26:58.280 and and more recent trauma our mother earth has trauma as well and it's a painful healing process

00:27:03.940 so it takes time

00:27:05.400 It's about that time we start unwinding

00:27:21.360 Any hope we're wrapped around

00:27:25.240 The distant light in the silent conversation

00:27:30.340 Never blossomed into the sound

00:27:33.520 Cause we were hard with her

00:27:36.420 We were broken out

00:27:38.820 And we were always forgetting lies

00:27:42.460 And we were flashbulbs

00:27:45.020 We were constellations

00:27:47.460 And we tried to connect the dots

00:27:51.460 And all this and all that

00:27:55.240 Nothing in between

00:27:57.100 Never did amount to a dime

00:28:00.780 If I ain't wish you could call this low tide and come back

00:28:05.060 Rise in the dark, in the dark for good

00:28:09.100 Now, outside of our individual and immediate experience with this global pandemic,

00:28:24.060 we're also grappling with how to make meaning of this message.

00:28:29.060 It's common to hear this crisis framed as a spiritual one or an ecological message sent from the animal queendom.

00:28:36.340 And it's also just as common to be reminded that historically, global crises actually cause modern economies to push themselves even further to make up for the lost gains.

00:28:47.940 So it's a critical time that requires isolation, handwashing, and medicine, of course, but it also requires prayer, contemplation, and courage.

00:28:57.340 and I'm wondering if you'd be willing to share

00:28:59.940 any of your own framing or reflections on this time.

00:29:03.760 Yeah, I mean, this is a time of great lessons

00:29:06.420 and it's a time when I believe that we are being reminded

00:29:10.680 that we have to rely on each other.

00:29:13.180 You know, I know my elders are relying on me

00:29:16.080 even though it's very difficult to self-isolate,

00:29:19.920 to not do the work that I love to do

00:29:23.620 over at United Tribes Technical College.

00:29:26.020 it's hard my elders are depending on me to not go near them at this time but to still make sure

00:29:33.680 that they're taken care of and so I think that there are a lot of lessons to be learned from

00:29:39.300 a global pandemic but I think that they are internal and everyone has their own lessons

00:29:46.760 they're learning their own ways of doing this and I guess for me it's about learning to

00:29:51.520 appreciate the silence, learning to appreciate the alone time, learning to appreciate the

00:29:57.900 downtime. I'm someone who constantly keeps myself very busy. And I've had to stop doing a lot of

00:30:06.280 activities that I really love and enjoy. And so I suppose if I were to frame it in a larger context,

00:30:12.960 it would be that we're all learning how to look within, or we should all be learning how to look

00:30:20.080 within. And then we're all learning how to apply what we find there to the outside world and do it

00:30:27.660 without necessarily being right in front of each other. I think one of the most frustrating things

00:30:33.780 about social media is that because we are not face-to-face, we feel like we have permission

00:30:42.160 to be cruel. When someone, when you can't feel their emotions, when you can't see their facial

00:30:48.800 expressions, when you can't see them hurting, you almost feel justified in being very purposefully

00:30:54.860 cruel. You know, I think that was the rise of internet trolls is such an interesting research

00:31:00.320 project. And right now, I'm seeing less of that. I'm seeing people learning to be kind to each

00:31:08.160 other and learning to try to read emotions from a distance, learning to try to read into feelings

00:31:14.400 from text messages and emails and, you know, learning to read people from over a webinar,

00:31:20.300 you know, and just from looking at them over, you know, through a camera lens. And maybe that's a

00:31:25.520 good thing, you know, maybe because we are in the internet age, maybe we're learning to be a little

00:31:30.780 kinder to each other, hopefully. Yeah, I hope so too. Now, I'd like to focus on some of the very

00:31:38.740 delicate areas of the popular narratives going around COVID-19. In the environmental realm,

00:31:44.980 the dominant narrative is one that highlights declining carbon emissions, a halt in many

00:31:50.100 forms of transportation, the reappearance of animal kin throughout heavily populated human

00:31:55.640 areas, and the reminder that we don't need as much oil as big companies are telling us we need,

00:32:02.460 or that actually there is a surplus of oil. But often, these conversations either romanticize or

00:32:08.700 oversimplify the true expense of this disease in terms of the human lives it will cost.

00:32:14.620 Indeed, it feels like we are veering into dangerous patterns of disposability, and

00:32:20.960 we must make no mistake that narratives of disposability are part of the colonial project.

00:32:27.680 Economies are slowing, yes, but at the expense of entire swaths of our global population.

00:32:33.620 So I wonder if you could speak to the complexity, but more important, the care that needs to

00:32:39.060 be exercised in processing global pandemics.

00:32:42.060 Yeah, I've been seeing that a lot too, people talking about how skies are clearing over

00:32:47.040 Hong Kong and dolphins are swimming in waterways in various parts of Europe for the first time. 0.99

00:32:54.200 Excuse my language, but it's bullshit. 0.97

00:32:56.120 It's the poor and the vulnerable who are dying. 0.99

00:32:59.140 The destruction of our planet is not a poor and vulnerable people issue.

00:33:03.000 In fact, you know, the poor have probably caused the least amount of pollution on our planet.

00:33:07.620 This is an elitist issue.

00:33:09.840 It's the rich, it's major corporations and large industries. 0.98

00:33:13.500 They're the ones causing the destruction of our water and our soil and our air.

00:33:17.560 And we need to see how that ideology, you know, the idea that human lives are the cost for cleaner air, that serves the 1%.

00:33:26.040 That serves the rich.

00:33:27.700 It takes the blame and the focus off of them.

00:33:30.400 And it's highly destructive.

00:33:31.960 and if anything is making me angry during this time, it is that.

00:33:37.920 Yeah. I mean, going back to social media and just media in general, there's so much coming at us

00:33:43.380 from all angles. And there are a lot of dangerous narratives that we need to

00:33:49.720 understand. And I think that if we don't really look at them with a critical lens,

00:33:56.460 that we will repeat the same destructive issues over and over again and really hurt each other.

00:34:03.060 I think that the fact that carbon emissions are lower is a lesson to look at. Let's look at that.

00:34:11.840 But you can't just put it on a meme and then one sentence later, wrap it up and then everybody go,

00:34:17.740 hooray. It's so much more complex than that. So I really appreciate you speaking to that.

00:34:23.920 And yeah, this pandemic is showing us the extremes of our lived experience.

00:34:29.120 We're becoming, again, acutely aware that a different world is in fact possible.

00:34:35.000 I think of the prisoners who were mandated to remain incarcerated for decades now released

00:34:40.360 early to be with their families, workers at grocery stores whose value was estimated to

00:34:45.120 be below the minimum wage now recognized as essential, and cities across the country

00:34:50.280 finding housing for the homeless.

00:34:52.660 So after telling us for years that there weren't the funds or the space to do so, but I also

00:34:59.480 wonder what happens to this power when the virus weakens or when life resumes to some

00:35:05.240 sort of normal, what will endure?

00:35:08.560 How do you think we can hold onto this momentum as so many are awakening to anti-capitalism

00:35:14.280 and how can we ensure that we don't allow global powers to divert our attention amidst

00:35:19.860 a public health crisis, and a likely global recession. What does recovery from this pandemic

00:35:25.480 look like? It's a great question. My hope is that we will not forget that the only people who are

00:35:32.640 keeping the world running at this time are the people, as you said, who have been deemed sort of

00:35:38.620 at the bottom of the economic ladder. My own son, he's 18, and he works at a grocery store.

00:35:47.000 and he's actually high risk because he's asthmatic.

00:35:51.160 And I was finally able to get him to take some time off of work

00:35:54.160 because I was so concerned.

00:35:56.380 I actually posted about how concerned I was on Facebook

00:35:59.500 and I was shocked that people's reaction were,

00:36:02.780 oh, isn't he so brave to be putting himself at risk to bag people's groceries?

00:36:09.180 And I was so angry at people who were talking that way

00:36:13.000 because it's like, he should not be the one putting himself at risk. And if that is an

00:36:19.180 essential service, if my son bagging groceries for his high school job, if that is an essential

00:36:24.680 service, then why are the 1% not recognizing that? Why is he making minimum wage if he is so

00:36:33.800 essential? And so as we watch how these stock markets plunge, when actually no real infrastructure

00:36:41.280 has been destroyed, you know, and no natural resources, you know, we still, as you said,

00:36:46.480 have oil and all of that. If the stock markets plunge through all of that and our economy is

00:36:51.580 crashing, what does that actually say about the labor of people like my son? You know,

00:36:58.040 what does that actually mean about the importance of people who are doing these jobs,

00:37:04.060 fulfilling these essential services, as they're called? And how do we make sure that the people

00:37:11.340 who are in these sort of upper economic echelons, if we want to talk about it that way, what will

00:37:18.160 they do after all of this is over? Will they still recognize that importance? Well, I think that

00:37:23.240 that's going to have to be up to us. I think that we are going to have to constantly remind them and

00:37:28.140 not ever let them forget. I have seen a lot of people having this discussion, but with no plan

00:37:34.280 about how to constantly remind the 1% of this. What happens? Maybe in the future, it's just going 0.76

00:37:41.920 to mean that we have to stop working for them. Maybe it means that we have to stop pumping their 0.90

00:37:48.420 gas and we have to stop bagging their groceries and we have to stop cleaning their hotel rooms

00:37:53.980 in their hospital rooms in order to make them see how essential and how important people's labor

00:38:00.480 is. Yeah, I'm with you. I think that, yeah, as you were speaking, I just couldn't help but

00:38:09.380 look back to some of my own reflections, especially the importance of using this time

00:38:14.600 to organize and potentially stop doing the grunt work, the labor, what people have deemed as this 0.89

00:38:25.660 less worthy work for the 1%. And I think looking in this country, there are a lot of us who are

00:38:33.260 really safe in comparison to what is going on elsewhere. Of course, there's struggle, but I was

00:38:38.920 just reading this article in India of this mass exodus. And it was horrifying seeing these images.

00:38:45.680 But I think instead of just talking about it or sharing memes through social media,

00:38:53.080 I really feel like we need to use this fleeting moment to demand Medicare for all

00:38:57.680 and participate in rent strikes, for example. And so I wonder if you could speak to the importance

00:39:03.560 of taking action now, organizing to ensure that we do in fact see measurable change at the end

00:39:10.960 of this pandemic? Absolutely. Now is the time to demand that infrastructural change, Medicare for

00:39:17.640 all, and talking to people about a living wage, demanding a living wage, realizing that people

00:39:25.720 who are working in these labor jobs, these labor positions, them struggling actually has

00:39:33.660 a negative impact on the entire economy and on sort of our emotional wellness as well,

00:39:42.960 the emotional wellness of the entire country. And that has much more of a trickle down and

00:39:49.660 trickle up effect than actual cash does. So we have to demand this. We have to be voting. It's

00:39:57.120 coming up soon and we have to vote that way. We have to vote for the person and the people who

00:40:03.900 are going to make sure that those lessons, these lessons that we've learned from COVID-19 are never

00:40:10.340 forgotten. I can't stress it enough. Voting is what's going to be essential, demanding that

00:40:17.240 change from the people that we put into office is going to be critical and making sure that

00:40:22.200 the people who are denying that to us are thrown out. Yes, absolutely. And I do think that we are

00:40:30.920 in such a unique time because this country, the government of the United States and all over the

00:40:40.360 world, there's a lot of chaos. There's a lot of lack of stability. So I think if we do organize,

00:40:48.720 if we really do take this time when we're at home, when we don't have our schedules full to the brim,

00:40:55.000 that we actually can make a lot of change with voting and otherwise because we're in a place

00:41:01.100 where things are fragile. There is a lot of opportunity to say no or to say yes, whatever

00:41:08.780 demands that we're speaking to, I could imagine them really taking hold. Like if enough people

00:41:15.320 striked for rent freeze, what could they do about it at this point? You know, it's kind of like,

00:41:20.200 wow, we have a lot at our fingertips if we really get together through the internet or in other ways

00:41:28.700 to make a big change. And so I am holding onto that. And, you know, it's just such a strange

00:41:36.200 time, though, I also wanted to speak to that, and you spoke to this a bit in your last response,

00:41:41.000 that we are also being reminded that it's really easy to capitalize on our fear, particularly to

00:41:48.200 enact draconian and authoritarian measures. And once these measures are passed, there's no telling

00:41:53.160 if they'll be rescinded once the virus slows. For example, just last week, the EPA announced a

00:41:58.600 freeze on enforcing environmental regulations for an indefinite amount of time due to the

00:42:04.380 coronavirus, explaining that they will not seek penalties when major polluters fail to follow

00:42:10.040 legal requirements on hazardous waste management and air and water pollution. So with that in mind,

00:42:16.980 I'd like to turn towards the importance of creating resilience and freedom where we can,

00:42:22.460 because it's not enough to be acutely aware of what might be taken away. We have to proactively

00:42:28.700 engage with what we can create for ourselves. So I'd love if you could speak to your work with

00:42:35.280 cultivating food sovereignty and stopping the exploitation of body, land, and water.

00:42:41.520 So yeah, I think that all of these lightning of environmental regulations, along with what the EPA

00:42:47.540 did in suspending those laws, Trump was weakening fuel economy standards, and different states were

00:42:56.080 passing laws to criminalize fossil fuel protests and things like that, you know, right under our

00:43:01.820 noses. And that's really, in my opinion, the sign of a tyrannical government, you know, people who

00:43:07.020 are exploiting and this government who's so opportunistic, right, that they're exploiting

00:43:12.480 us at our weakest time, a time when we are supposed to be in quarantine, you know, a time

00:43:17.260 when we're scared about getting sick and seeing our relatives or people dying around us, the

00:43:22.660 government and their rich allies are selling off their stocks and lining their pockets with our

00:43:29.140 suffering and a lot of cash. So it's really a time for us to stand up and say, okay, how can we not

00:43:37.620 be part of that system? How can we help to dismantle that system that is oppressing us?

00:43:44.780 And one of the best ways, in my opinion, that we can do that is by growing our own food.

00:43:49.080 we can grow our own food if you live in an area where you only have a balcony or a porch you can

00:43:57.380 grow food in containers i'm always amazed at the amount of usable space that is around apartment

00:44:05.240 buildings that is filled with rocks and gravel demand that that those rocks and that gravel be

00:44:11.500 taken out and throw some topsoil on there and start growing your own food even if you have to

00:44:16.640 start small the first year and you're only growing lettuce you know growing lettuce growing small

00:44:21.480 things that start that is an act of resistance and it will just expand and grow year after year

00:44:27.540 after year because once you get that feeling of being independent of growing your own food of

00:44:33.540 feeding yourself and your family and your community once you get that feeling it spreads and you've

00:44:39.560 almost become dependent on it and you you know that next year you're going to go bigger you're

00:44:43.920 going to plant more, you're going to expand your gardens, and you see that garden bed in the median

00:44:50.120 in the middle of the street, and you're like, hey, some apple trees would grow perfectly there.

00:44:55.760 You know, that feeling is going to spread. It only takes a couple of people to start it in a

00:45:00.780 particular neighborhood, and then the rest of the neighborhood will join in, and especially when you

00:45:05.500 tell them about why it's important. So along with actually growing our own food and planting

00:45:10.860 our own food and saving seeds it's important to share why we're doing that a lot of people will

00:45:17.920 get so frustrated because they'll have their own garden and you know they'll have neighbors and

00:45:23.600 other people coming and saying hey do you want to share some of those cucumbers with me can you

00:45:28.240 spare a squash things like that but they're not actually saying to their neighbors well here's a

00:45:34.080 squash make sure to save the seeds from that so that you and I can plant them next year I'll teach

00:45:39.840 you how to grow this. The education behind that's so important. And it's not just the education in

00:45:45.540 growing food. You know, we have to teach people how to grow their own food. We have to encourage

00:45:50.560 them to grow their own food. But we do not just live in food deserts. We have to understand that

00:45:57.000 we don't just live in food deserts. We live in culinary deserts where people have forgotten how

00:46:02.560 to cook good food. And you know, a lot of people are embarrassed by that. You know, you hand them

00:46:08.120 a kohlrabi, for example, or something even more common than that, hand them a squash and ask them

00:46:14.640 if they know how to cook it. And there's going to be a lot of people, even in indigenous communities

00:46:19.480 who do not know how to cook a squash. And so we have to teach people how to cook these items.

00:46:25.740 And then we also need to encourage them to change their palates, to appreciate traditional foods,

00:46:31.460 to appreciate good foods over time. It's not going to happen overnight. People aren't going

00:46:36.100 to give up fry bread overnight. I've tried, but we need to encourage them. Okay. I'm not asking

00:46:42.460 you to give up fry bread, but just try adding the squash into your diet a couple of times a week,

00:46:47.080 or adding a salad into your repertoire a few times a week. And here's how you make it. And

00:46:52.780 this is what benefits it has. And this is how you make it taste amazing. You know, it requires just

00:46:59.180 a passion for food, it requires a passion for the plants, and it requires a passion for our planet

00:47:06.880 and a passion for our community, a love of our community, wanting them to be healthier,

00:47:13.040 not just physically healthier, but more spiritually and emotionally healthy.

00:47:18.200 Yes, I love hearing that. And I never thought about the culinary desert, but

00:47:23.400 i completely see that i think a few years ago before i grew squash i probably wouldn't have

00:47:30.300 known what to do with a lot of them i don't think i did and also some of them are so hard to cut

00:47:34.780 that i think i probably gave up as soon as i couldn't get like a dull knife through one and

00:47:39.120 realized like i don't know what i'm doing with this big hard thing and you know it's really it's

00:47:44.100 just when you were talking about how it could be well i guess the word came up contagious in a

00:47:49.660 positive way. Getting your hands in the soil and growing food, it gets you. Working with plants,

00:47:58.120 the plants get you. I've experienced this with myself and so many others. There's that resistance

00:48:03.760 wall that feels like we could be so distant from the plants, but then once we welcome them in

00:48:08.500 and we smell them, we feel them, we touch the seeds, we feel the soil in our fingertips,

00:48:13.640 Like something magical really happens. And I think that you're right. If people just start small and it can grow within the community and there's an excitement around it and then you have a potluck when we can have those again and we're sharing the food from our gardens, no matter if it's a container garden on our balcony or otherwise, there's something so connective and primordial that all of our ancestors did at one point.

00:48:39.100 And so I think there's a lot of healing that comes with food sovereignty on so many levels, physical, spiritual. There's a lot of purpose in it. And so I love hearing you talk about this because it feels really good.

00:48:53.920 And I think that, like you were saying at the beginning of our conversation about laughter, we do need to feel good at times right now. Of course, we need to be taking in the truths and the hard truths. But if we don't have time where we're having a connection to joy and laughter and just that reverence, that feeling of reverence, I think it'll be really detrimental to us.

00:49:17.420 And I know that there's a lot of grief and panic and anxiety in the whole global sphere at the moment because of the internet and social media and just 24-7 hour news streams, which I do not think us humans have been evolved to deal with this type of global news 24 hours, seven days a week.

00:49:36.340 And we hear how many frontline responders are testing positive in New York. And we're aware of the increase in cases across Navajo Nation. And we're witnessing the spraying of migrant workers in India and just the atrocities of the position that the refugees are in in Syria.

00:49:54.440 I mean, stranded in camps without soap or water, and I think this is causing both collective grief and an anticipatory grief, rightfully so, so amidst a time when we need to be nourishing our immune systems and we can't help but weaken them through our overpowering emotions, and like I said, rightly so, because we just can't turn away from the state of the world,

00:50:17.000 I'm wondering if you could speak to how we can calm ourselves and how these tools will also be necessary in recovering from this pandemic over the long term, because we know it's not going away overnight or even in April.

00:50:29.940 It's not going away.

00:50:31.640 And anytime that I really feel myself getting anxious, you know, I try to stay as on top

00:50:39.200 of the news as possible, but I only allow myself a certain number of views per day.

00:50:46.740 Because as you said, this constant stream, I really can become obsessive about it.

00:50:52.000 Because if I miss news, you know, especially where people are dying and people are suffering,

00:50:56.640 it's almost as if I feel guilty for missing it.

00:50:59.320 You know, oh, how couldn't I have known that, you know, those two grandmothers passed away up on, you know, the White Earth Reservation or down on the Diné Reservation.

00:51:08.900 It makes me feel like, oh, I'm missing this suffering of my relatives and I should really be witness to it so that I can talk to people about it in the future.

00:51:19.000 The very first thing I do when I start to feel that anxious is I breathe.

00:51:24.820 I take super deep breaths.

00:51:26.840 In fact, I take four super deep breaths, counting to 10 on the way in and counting

00:51:32.600 again to 10 on the way out each time, just focusing on the numbers, just focusing on

00:51:38.480 the counting and taking those deep breaths.

00:51:41.240 You know, sometimes I'll say to my students, how many times a day do you take a super deep

00:51:46.740 breath?

00:51:47.340 How many times a day do you take air all the way into your lungs?

00:51:52.640 you know and they will often say to me that they can't even remember the last time that they did

00:51:58.380 that let alone doing that even once a day they can't remember the last time they ever thought

00:52:04.100 about that or did that and so the first thing I always do is breathe and I encourage people

00:52:09.200 to take deep breaths and it's even better if you can get outside get near a tree get on a patch of

00:52:17.460 grass, get into a garden, whatever you can do, whatever you can find, get out and get in touch

00:52:24.900 with your plant relatives in whatever way you can and take those deep breaths in that spot.

00:52:32.500 And it's so calming and it's so reassuring. It makes all the difference in the world.

00:52:39.100 And it's difficult to talk about this, but I, in my home, we burn plants quite a bit. We smudge.

00:52:46.920 I guess is the popular term for it. Lakotas use the word azilia, you know, to purify the air

00:52:53.800 around you. And I think that that's really important. But I was on a webinar yesterday

00:53:01.260 where I said, if you are not native, do not use our sage to smud with, do not over harvest it.

00:53:10.500 You know, a lot of our species of sage, especially like the California white sage,

00:53:14.540 Selvia apiana is being terribly over harvested and overexploited. And so what I always say is

00:53:21.220 you can burn rosemary and it's fantastic. Even the, you know, the stuff you get at store in a

00:53:27.820 bottle, you know, put some of that in a dish and burn it. It's antimicrobial. It purifies the air

00:53:33.780 and there's plenty of it. You do not have to go out and exploit traditional indigenous medicine

00:53:39.460 in order to purify the air through burning of plants.

00:53:43.960 You know, there's just so many that you can do.

00:53:46.060 You can walk outside and grab some juniper off of your juniper bush

00:53:50.640 that's growing right outside of your yard

00:53:53.020 or maybe in the tree row across the street or something like that.

00:53:57.860 And you can, you know, get some of those juniper berries.

00:54:00.220 You don't have to use threatened or endangered species

00:54:03.840 just because somehow the media has taught you

00:54:06.880 that those plants are somehow more sacred than others all plants are sacred you know and so

00:54:12.420 of course they have different medicinal properties and that's fine but you know the point to burning

00:54:17.920 plants is to purify the air and there are lots of extremely common plants that have those properties

00:54:24.440 so breathing smudging making sure that you get outside in the sun as much as possible

00:54:30.860 that's difficult to do in northern climates where i am sitting right now in bismarck north dakota

00:54:36.160 We are expecting five inches of snow tonight in April.

00:54:40.680 So, you know, and that's fairly common.

00:54:42.700 So it's difficult to get out in the sun, but make sure that you're doing that as much as

00:54:46.680 possible, getting that gorgeous vitamin D.

00:54:49.580 Make sure that you are eating well, as I said earlier, making sure that, you know, you're

00:54:55.160 communicating and talking to people, being open to that.

00:54:59.280 You know, we are taught that the expression of emotion is something odd or something to

00:55:04.120 be ashamed of.

00:55:05.020 But, you know, I called my mother yesterday and I cried to her. I cried like a baby, I suppose, you know, and cried to my mom just about how stressed I am and about how difficult things are. And I felt so much better afterward. And I then talked to my partner and I talked to my kids and we watched a movie together and we took a walk.

00:55:27.600 And doing these things are just so important and so vital and, you know, showing love and appreciation for the plant nations, for the food that we're eating, you know, even if they're animals, showing love and appreciation for the people around us, not forgetting to have gratitude.

00:55:46.020 It's vital right now.

00:55:57.600 It won't occur, but long for the ride It's not a joke, no, it's some kind of bad idea

00:56:13.600 When we made the road, when we grew the tree,

00:56:21.600 are you gonna let this, let this?

00:56:25.600 Are you gonna let this come undone?

00:56:29.600 Are you gonna make this right?

00:56:43.600 I feel so much better just from you saying all those things.

00:56:51.480 I was so riled up in my question and I was feeling like I didn't even realize it until

00:56:57.820 you said breathe and I was realizing that I was actually holding my breath and I had

00:57:02.380 all this tension in my chest and in my throat and when you were explaining breathing, I

00:57:09.020 actually did that and the amount of release I felt, as simple as that sounds, it almost

00:57:13.480 as silly how simple it is and how I know that I forget doing that. And when I'm holding my breath,

00:57:19.520 the anxiety that builds, it's really interesting somatically to experience that. And I just did it

00:57:24.920 right now. So that is really important for us to remember. And yeah, thank you also for speaking

00:57:31.100 to the plant medicine. I never thought about burning rosemary, but that's such a good idea.

00:57:35.480 And it reminded me of thyme or arugano. I know rosemary glow.

00:57:40.180 Yeah. And I love that. And yeah, I am so with you. We do not need to be using,

00:57:48.120 especially for those of us who are not native to this land, to Turtle Island, we don't need to be

00:57:52.960 using sage. It's not necessary at all. There are so many beautiful plants that are waiting for us

00:57:58.280 to give them attention and to smell them, rosemary, thyme, oregano. Oh my gosh, they're

00:58:05.760 they're incredible i love culinary herbs like those and so many others and yeah thank you for

00:58:12.140 speaking to that because i think it's important for us to know there are so many other plants

00:58:16.620 available for us to interact with and you know it's not just no to sage it's like but there's

00:58:22.880 yes to all these other beautiful creatures that are wanting our relationships so it's yeah it's

00:58:29.580 Heck, I wish I had a little rosemary with me right now.

00:58:33.160 So yeah, I really love those herbs.

00:58:35.620 And Linda, this has been so wonderful.

00:58:37.760 And I just, I don't want to start closing this conversation, but I do want to make sure

00:58:43.400 we talk about the survival meal kits that you're preparing.

00:58:47.020 I was reading on Facebook that you and your partner are preparing survival meal kits for

00:58:51.720 elders on Standing Rock and the Cheyenne River reservations.

00:58:55.440 And so I mentioned this to find out if listeners can support this cause.

00:58:59.580 and if so, how? Thank you so much for mentioning that. That's really kind of you. Yeah. So my

00:59:05.160 partner and I are getting as many traditional ingredients together as possible. So for example,

00:59:11.940 wild rice and maple sugar, maple syrup, real dried hominy, traditional beans, things like that.

00:59:20.960 And we're even getting a lot of dried vegetables together, like dried vegetable mixes,

00:59:26.480 dried fruit traditional berries such as dried strawberries blueberries raspberries things like

00:59:32.140 that but we're also getting some non-traditional ingredients together foods such as coffee and

00:59:39.040 white flour and what else did our elders requests you know it's things like that that were very

00:59:46.740 comforting to them oh oil of course for them to cook with and so we've been getting all of these

00:59:53.660 items together and we're putting them into these kits. We're using these 18-gallon totes

01:00:00.100 and we're trying to put a month's worth, 30 days worth of food into each tote to give to elders

01:00:08.260 on Standing Rock and Cheyenne River and within our local communities. Our elders are petrified.

01:00:14.860 They are so scared and some of them are so frightened to go to the grocery store that

01:00:19.760 they're just not doing it. And there's no one else to bring them food. And so a lot of them

01:00:24.600 are going hungry, but they're too scared to go to the store right now because they've been told

01:00:29.600 that that's a hugely risky area for them. And of course, they are at a higher risk than most young

01:00:35.760 people, or they tend to be at a higher risk. And so some of them I've been seeing and I've been

01:00:40.800 hearing stories about elders sitting in the parking lot of the Walmart, asking people to go

01:00:45.620 in and buy groceries for them and bring them out and then wiping them down with Clorox wipes

01:00:50.640 once they get outside, you know, and it's especially on areas like Standing Rock and

01:00:55.360 Cheyenne River that are so remote. Some of our elders live two and a half hours from the nearest

01:01:00.660 Walmart, two and a half hours from the nearest major grocery store. So it's, you know, a very

01:01:05.960 difficult time for them. So we're putting these kits together, these 18 gallon totes, and we'll

01:01:10.980 be handing them out to as many elders as possible. We've actually received enough funds to make more

01:01:16.700 than 50. We had originally planned on 50. It's just my partner and I, and we don't want to

01:01:22.020 expose anyone or ourselves to other people right now because we're supposed to be in quarantine.

01:01:28.580 So it's just the two of us having these items delivered to our very tiny home. And, you know,

01:01:34.280 so it's a challenge, but we're getting it together and then we're going to hand them out.

01:01:39.140 And with any of the funds that we have left over after these 50, we are going to make more kits that are the same with a lot of these beautiful, healthy foods and some other less traditional stuff.

01:01:51.460 And we are going to hand them out to displaced students, displaced families who may have, for instance, on the United Tribes campus, we have students who live in student housing and have nowhere else to go.

01:02:05.320 and so they've been sort of left without any options besides trying to run over to McDonald's

01:02:12.320 and things like that so we'll start trying to make kits for them as well but we want to keep

01:02:17.180 feeding elders as much as possible and we're using a lot of non-perishable foods luckily

01:02:22.120 traditional indigenous foods of course tend to be very non-perishable so we're even including dried

01:02:28.220 canned meat in these kits as well and if anyone wants to contribute to that then they can

01:02:34.440 paypalme at lynda.black.elk at gmail.com or they can venmo at lynda blackout so thanks so much for

01:02:44.320 asking that oh of course it's such a beautiful offering and i was imagining these kits that

01:02:52.040 you were creating and what a gift of not only physical nourishment but just the relief that

01:02:59.340 these elders and other folks will know that they're being cared for, that they're being

01:03:04.100 thought of, that they're being acknowledged, that they know that somebody's looking out for

01:03:08.480 them. I think just that alone, that care is so relieving and tender. And it reminds me of other

01:03:17.880 things we've talked about in this conversation, just how to be patient and how to really care

01:03:22.900 for people and plants and the earth, not just in this time, but especially in this time and maybe

01:03:28.900 this time is an awakening for even more people to start being in relationship in these ways.

01:03:36.100 And yeah, I love hearing what you're doing and it's really inspirational. And maybe folks can

01:03:43.280 not only donate, but also start doing something similar in their neighborhoods for their communities

01:03:48.460 and mutual aid. And it's, yeah. It's so important. And I also wanted to say we're including seed

01:03:55.080 packets in all of these kits, because we want to encourage people to grow their own food after

01:04:01.800 this. You know, it's really apparent that if we are growing our own food, we wouldn't be having

01:04:08.160 this problem right now. And I know it sounds strange, but elders have, you know, especially

01:04:13.240 our elders, indigenous elders around here, they grew up gardening. And so a lot of them already

01:04:19.800 know how to do it. They just lack the resources such as the seeds to do it. So we're including

01:04:26.460 these seed packets and we're of course going to include directions for each of those plants

01:04:31.760 and offering to come and till a garden for them. So I think, you know, we're not just trying to

01:04:37.140 think 30 days ahead, but we're trying to think much further ahead into the future with these

01:04:41.520 kids as well. Oh, I love that. That is such an important part of these baskets or these kids

01:04:48.140 just having the seeds in them it really goes with everything you've been saying

01:04:52.200 in this conversation and oh it's just like it brings a smile to my face because along with all

01:04:57.920 of the anxiety and overwhelm of what's coming at us from all these directions to hear what you're

01:05:05.800 tangibly doing in this way it's like okay we can focus our time we can organize we can take care

01:05:12.020 of others we have a lot to do in this time even if we're at home even if we feel like we're born

01:05:17.640 and we just need to watch Netflix shows, it's like, well, sure, put a Netflix show on while

01:05:22.200 you're making a basket for the elders. There's so much that we can be doing to take care of each

01:05:27.320 other and really build resiliency. And I love how you're doing things beyond just this 30 days,

01:05:32.760 because this is not going to be over soon. And whether or not COVID-19 ends in a few months,

01:05:41.320 climate change is here. Global capitalism and globalization, we're up against a lot

01:05:46.580 that is like a pandemic, but it's just not called a pandemic. And so I do think we have to be taking

01:05:52.120 this time as a lesson to know that other things are coming. And we can really learn so much right

01:05:59.500 now. And that in a weird way gives me hope to know that we can take this time, organize,

01:06:06.880 become more resilient in our communities. And so when the next thing hits, hopefully,

01:06:12.280 we'll be much more prepared than we were this time around. So yeah, Linda, this has been such

01:06:17.960 a beautiful conversation and I could talk to you all day and I would love to hopefully have a

01:06:24.240 follow-up conversation and talk even more about plants and the land because I know you have so

01:06:29.720 much to share and I feel really honored and grateful that you spoke so directly to COVID-19

01:06:35.820 because it's not something that we've been talking to guests about so directly and I felt like you

01:06:40.300 were somebody who could speak to the pandemic with such a breadth of wisdom and care. And I

01:06:48.060 really feel that we need to hear your voice right now. And of course, other times as well, but right

01:06:54.060 now folks need guidance and I know I do. And so thank you for sharing this time with us.

01:07:01.220 Thank you so much for having me and letting me speak. And yeah, I just wanted to say that,

01:07:07.420 you know, anything that I've said and anything that I know, it all comes from my people, my

01:07:12.780 elders, you know, other knowledge holders who have gifted me with what they know. And so I

01:07:18.460 want to say thank you to all of them and to you for having me. And yeah, much wishes for good

01:07:25.420 things for you and yours. Thanks for listening to another episode of For the Wild podcast.

01:07:37.420 I'm Carter Lou McElroy

01:07:39.440 and the music you heard today was from

01:07:41.100 Maddie Palanin and Chris Pareka

01:07:42.980 I'd like to thank our founder and host

01:07:45.700 Ayanna Young

01:07:46.460 as well as the rest of our podcast production team

01:07:49.340 Aidan McRae

01:07:50.720 Andrew Storrs

01:07:52.200 Erica Ekrem

01:07:53.480 Erin Wise

01:07:54.780 Francesca Glassbell

01:07:56.480 Hannah Wilton

01:07:57.660 and Melanie Younger

For The Wild - April 15, 2020

LINDA BLACK ELK on What Endures After Pandemic ⧸171

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