Hello, reader. How are you doing? I love Eugene. What a green place to live–I’ve decided I really like it and want to stay a while with Ming. This is our home for now. I love how Eugene changes me.
Did I already tell you about the freedom I feel here to experience the full extent of my gender / not gender? Did I already tell you about the trees with moss and lichen, and then a fern grows out of the moss?
The rivers are here. In Vegas I liked to go to the riverbed to pray. Ming would take me out to Red Rock, and I would lie in a river bed on my tummy, cry, and talk to my mom. But here in the Pacific Northwest, the riverbeds are entirely full of river. How could there be this much water?
learning
It’s a lot of water–it’s very special to have this much moving water. Yet somehow it’s not enough. It seems so plentiful, you’d think we could be extravagant with water, almost wasteful. But of course it’s work to purify the water and pipe it into our homes.
There are struggles with dams and electricity. Wild animals have their needs. Rich people want to get richer–logging is a big deal in Oregon. I’m figuring out my place here, two years in.
I need to learn more about the local area, and I’m finally listening to lectures by David Lewis who is a local indigenous scholar. He reminds me of people I knew a long time ago. My dear chosen family member and I started reading the new David Lewis book yesterday. Please consider reading it: Tribal Histories of the Willamette Valley.
I feel happy to finally fulfill my vow of getting educated about this land which is my home now. Gradually I learn about the plant life too.
This is a favorite video featuring David Lewis. It helped me learn about Native food ways and some other local basics.
how Eugene changes me
Recently I was on my porch at 5am watching the snow and crying.
I was crying for two reasons. First reason– it was so beautiful. Second reason– I missed my homeland. I had a strong feeling like, “I don’t belong here.”
In my homeland the sun shines almost every day. It’s not hot or cold most days, and it never snows. There will be morning fog and clouds that burn off by afternoon. Sometimes it’s windy, but daily sunshine is important to my well being. I took it for granted.
I could try living in my homeland again. But housing prices are incredible, and my homeland doesn’t have my mom anymore, so what’s the point? I cried on the porch, watching the snow fall, because I felt like without my mom, I had no homeland at all.
I told all this to my dear one.
“But home is people and relationships,” my dear one explained. “You always have home.”
“Yeah, in a way you’re right,” I said.
I was thinking of eucalyptus trees, the smell of the beach, fresh strawberries, live oak trees, the spirits of the land, the spirits of the water.
True that Ming is home, Bunny, dear ones, my own body. A theme of these past few years is home and search for home. I guess I found it. Ming is the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.
I love how Eugene changes me, and I’m on earth to change. Always learning.
