not native fruit

delaware more ties

I've been reading Weslager's "Delaware's Forgotten Folk, The Story of the Moors and Nanticokes," the book that everyone said would help to put it all together for me.  Well, I have to say it has.  One of the things that helped was understanding the mess created by the school problem in early twentieth century mixed-blood communities in Delaware, problems that affected attitudes and divisions among people during my mother's and her peers' lifetimes.  Also, of special interest to me was the notion that the so-called 'Moors,' the people my grandfather identified with, were one of the remnants of the Lenape (Delaware) native peoples, probably the ones living furthest south in that time of major movement of refugee people.  My husband's people were also probably part-Lenape, and so that confirms something he and I have felt for a long time.

I've decided I don't feel comfortable calling myself part-native-american or part-african-american, more comfortable calling myself part-white or simply 'white' (with reservations, no pun intended).  However, I do feel comfortable acknowledging that my family had a 'moor' lineage.  My chinese daoist teacher, Jeffrey Yuen, talks a lot about our inherited constitutional factors, which relate both to our genes and to our past lives, and he refers to getting in touch with our lineage.  That message has been very timely for me, since that seems to be exactly what is happening in my life. 

Outside knowledge or information is somewhat helpful, but the main stream of the lineage comes from within myself, from my own memories of my family, my early environment in Philadelphia and south Jersey, my own experiences.  Also, there is quite a bit of dream material that relates to our lineage, which of course I did not recognize until recently. 

I've also really come to understand that my father, a sailor, was not exactly an 'immigrant' to this country.  As a seaman, he traveled all around the world, and of all the possible places he chose the Delaware River area because he really just loved the indigenous people there.  He chose my mother because he loved her and because she was one of those people he already loved.  I think it came as a bit of a shock to him, a Dane by birth, that - possibly because of me - my mother was trying to distance herself from her people.  Oh, the ironies of life!  But - well, I don't know if you can understand this, but - it's been something of a healing for me to realize all of this. 

There was something missing inside me, or some rift within me, that this knowledge has healed.  It almost feels strange to share this in such a public forum, but I do so in the knowledge that sharing this may help someone else. 

Somehow all of this has been buidling to some kind of completion - or so it has felt to me - just recently, so imagine my surprise when I went to the mitsawokett site (the official delaware moor site) yesterday and found that they have posted my family's pictures.  I felt I might not have consclusive enough proof that my great-grandmother was the same Mary Carney born in Delaware somewhere between 1832 and 1835.  But I knew that she and her son, my grandfather, saw themselves as 'moors,' and that her mother's name was Louisa.  Likely that her father's name was John, as well, since that is what she named her first son who was born out of wedlock. 

It does help to be able to put a name to my experience and to understand the kinds of conflicts that drove my mother in a color-conscious society such as Philadelphia's was in her day. But even more than that, it establishes a warm feeling inside me about myself and my mother's family, and my father's love for her.  Out of that love I came.

more california

Speaking of California reminds me of how much the minerals here have meant to me.  The part of Berkeleywhere we live is dotted with massive rock outcroppings, mostly of rhyolite, a volcanic mineral where obsidian is often found.  At one time this area was proposed for preservation as a park, and I can see just how wonderful such a park would have been.  In a very real sense the amazing energy generated by these boulders and outcrops would have been more accessible to more people, if it had not been overlaid by the buildings, streets, roadways, cars – and especially – houses and people who obscure the true virtue of the place.  In a way, it’s like what happened to the Los Angeles area, a place that emits healing energy if you can find a non-humanized plot of land to feel it in.  But the emotional energy of human drama really changes a place unless you have some way of getting down underneath it, for example long-term meditation practice.  Anyway, even with the presence of dense human population, this area still shines with mineral health, and with its proximity to the ocean it’s no wonder people feel good here, get out and bicycle, garden, walk, and live into their nineties. 

Speaking of human dramas, we just saw a fun little movie on rented DVD called ‘The King of California’ with Michael Douglas.  It was about finding buried treasure – Conquistador’s Gold – underneath the local Costco.  This must be a theme that is coming to consciousness in these last several years.  I also wrote a little novel in…2001?…about finding conquistador gold in a remote place.  I love the Costco idea – my idea was more conventional, I’m afraid.  But anyway, I've decided to get back to it, finish it up.  I find that I've been able to get back to my original voice, and the fact that I've lived with this story for so long, and seen how distorted it can be by other writers, that I know exactly what I want to say now, and know better how to say it.  I'm excited about returning to this project.

And what better time to begin again than on Chinese New Year?  Today, January 26, 2009 is the start of Earth Ox Year - please visit my Birthday Safari Twelve Animals website to read more about Earth Ox, and extrapolate from his description to a description of the coming year. 

Wishing you all the very best in it!

california

i am so moved by the beauty and texture of our environment.  i grew up in philadelphia and i think when i first came to california with my partner in the early '70's and saw my first redwood trees, i must have felt as if i were living in 30,000 b.c.  it seemed like a completely new and different world.

i sense that many people come here to live in berkeley because they want something different, but it ends up being about eating at certain places, getting a good latte down on fourth street or something.  but really all we need is to tune in to the land here - the land, water and sky.  it is pure magic.

The colors, the shapes of the land - the contours of the coastline and of the hills - the shapes and textures of the trees and shrubs - camphor, manzanita, madrone, buckeye, live-oak - the presence of wildlife, birds, foxes, coyotes, deer, raccoon, possums, skunks and squirrels - the clarity of the sky, bright stars at night, clean mineral blue in the daytime, or crystal silver-gray with rain, white with fog.  Rock outcroppings, granite mountains, obsidian chunks, lakes, rivers, the blessed ocean. 

This land reaches out to touch you, it enters into you with its fragrant breath, it makes its home inside you, and all its textures become yours. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

bela says happy new year