Pakāhcekaew - Lightning Strikes

**Disclaimer: Sexual Assault, trauma, gore references, MMIW/P** ❤️‍🩹

Anyone who has experienced elements of this, my heart goes out to you.

I have been let down by support systems throughout my life whilst experiencing emotional abuse and, at times, sexual abuse. This year has been a great struggle surrounding this part of my life experience. By people who have been close to me and who I deemed trustworthy. My family, my friends, my relatives-community members, my schools. This year it was at a school I got to attend for a brief time.

In my first few weeks, I began to experience a lot of misogny (perpetuated by both men and women), which was a norm so much so that I constantly second guessed and feared I was being overdramatic, maybe even misintrepreting cultural differences. So I tried to trust some of male peers and a teacher. Especially since I wasn't making many friends yet. A few male students and I became closer and joked a lot with one another, both in art classes, which was a passion of mine I've been exploring more and opening up to again.

We'll call one of the friends Lee and the other Kyle. And we'll call the male teacher Mr. Dubois.

So, Lee and I practiced more in this art class and we hung out for lunch one time in town and at a theater.

Around this time, Kyle and I stuck with hanging out in class and at lunch sometimes. He made me laugh a lot, not unnormal for my usual friendships with men.

And Mr. Dubois, he seemed friendly and used a lot of jargon. Well kept and lectured a lot. Though he made little effort to recognize the woodland people or acknowledge with respect, my comments on our region of Natives in discussions on Native communities throughout the U.S. Through my observations in the following weeks/months, he made a lot of back handed comments towards woodland peoples intelligence, especially after I would comment in class with information I learned through my community, parents (educators), and home's tribal college. Further, he started to draw uncomfortably close whenever I would talk to him.

(in this first half of the semseter, i began forming a great friend group by the way, just so it's clear i'm buidling safe space alongside some friends)

Just before midterms, Kyle started staring at me and treating me with less respect than our classmates. And after a few classes of up and down-singled out attitude from him, he started flirting more obviously, walking close behind me up some stairs during a group project and then suddenly volunteering to lift me up onto some rusty bars several feet off the ground for a picture he wants to take for this group project. Immediatley, I felt unsafe and started distancing, realizing the reality of this situation.

A week or so before this, i hung back for a minute after the end of class to ask Mr. Dubois about a question on our quiz that confused me. He then stood an inch from my arm, and I felt this shocking waving up my arm and down my spine in fear. I went outside shortly after hearing his response, trying to hold it together for a few yards. I just started breaking down at a bench, crying and calling a loved one. Just confused and feeling a physical and mostly spiritual boundary just obliterated by this man. The call helped me feel grounded again, breathing yet leraning to be cautious of Mr. Dubois.

Just past midterms, Lee and I happened to both hop in a peer's film project. By this point, I picked up on the possibility he was interested in something aside from just hanging out, so during filming I maintained distance from him. This film was in a dank space. It was about kidnap, murder, escape, with a comedic twist. Something I never experienced being in. With my character's situation in the film, I could see and hear Lee's and one of the crew member's eyes and voices, noticing the near MMIW position my character was in. The crew man, a decade or something older, asking me to breath more heavily too and other things when the director was in another room.

Not naming or recognizing the MMIW situation for me (as the only woman actor) in any way, these men, whether through actions, words, or noises, started to doing things and/or discussing things to be done to me that were outside of the script. I was in shock. Numbed. I felt afraid. I felt scared in this dark dank space in a building within the city backstreets, miles away from the school.

I just shook in the bathroom, noticing the fake blood stained color, rubbing off on my shirt after having a fake blood stained cloth tied around my wrist (and mouth constantly). I realized, still in shock and trying to be an actor, that: 1, this was the wrong film for me. 2, this is not safe.

Against my intution, self-care, and prior knowledge (which had been nurtured for years prior up til attending this school), I thought,

"I can do this. Hold it together, get creative. it's just a film and it's an experience to try to explore a new genre of film I have been afraid of. Jenna Ortega does it."

Nope. This wasn't "just part of the genre" and I don't like the genre and never have so that's that.

This is fucking sexual harrassment.

But, I didn't let myself think too hard, because I was getting fucking numb and disillusioned after a month and however many weeks of build up from men (and women). So, I went out of the bathroom, came back to the cold, dank concrete floor where filming was, and started again.

But these men's stares, comments, and actions got worse. And Lee's usual talktive attitude I experienced, grew quieter and quieter. He acted and spoke in short answer replies without making eye contact when I'd talk to him. He just "acted."

And then, as his character was trying free my hands from being tied (my mouth still covered by the fake bloody cloth ) he started scraping my wrists with a coarse, jagged, spray painted cardboard that represented a metal shard for the scene. I wanted to say something, yet, was hazed and convincing myself it was a mistake. It lightly burned.

Moments later, we fought the antagonists. Our weapons got knocked out of our hands and he and I fell--as we were supposed to--got tied up together--as we were supposed to. And then, I started feeling something physically disorienting and off. A drowning feeling. I began turned my head a little further than I rehearsed for camera, and saw his knee crisscrosed against my butt and realized I felt his stomach against my back.

I don't want to say more about this evening from here, because honestly it fucking sucked. I just kep trying to move past this moment and fake celebrate the film with the cast and crew. For my voice, I want to say that the crew member who made those creepy ass comments (will not specify all of it) asked about working with him on some project of his that's outside of school. And Lee stayed quiet, continuously finding a way nearby me to sit or stand (often i'd notice him after turning around.)

This was the fucking worst part of my year. And yet there was more shit to come. More trauma. But healing, falling apart, resting, morphing, being loved and at peace. I experienced these too. Anger, pain, tears, and breath, joy, dance, freedom, home. Love

Mr. Dubois showed other petty attitudes towards me and woodland tribes. He did something to my exam. I got through his class and stuck to the books instead of his presence and eyes. I stayed back from Kyle. I cried with a friend who held space and shared experiences with me. I talked with a beautiful, spiriutal campus counselor and medicine man, befriending each. Both knowingly and unknowingly helping me cradle my light and guide me home. I reported to and was failed by title ix staff and the involved staff and faculty for this process. I tried to leave, had to stay according to one of these staff members. I dredged through it by phone calls, friends, family, counselor, medicine man, the teachers who were safe and supportive, the land...The garden where I felt, heard, and saw a sense of home you can feel anywhere you go. In the birds singing, the plants and trees wriggling, breathing life for me to share back to them, and blowing with the wind the ancestors ride and spoke to me from. Even the ants whose bro stung my toe, haha. The flowers who shined and kissed the earth, like stars in the sky. I hugged and loved my friends. i regretted not telling a crush my feelings. I knew I might not return. I thought of and grieved for my inner child... the childhood dream to be able to experience that school. Yet, I did experience it.

Returning home in my sneakers from an excruciating semester on a train across the country, back into the cold winter snow of our four season homes. Getting picked up from my dad in the chicago station. And in a funny, heater shot rez runner 3 and half hours back into the big woods. i was home. my home. snow of our original homelands and reservation. my home. the hares, waupoose (rabbit) family lineage as i illustrated in my art. the converstions approaching of our sturgeon/namāēw relatives who return in spring, as they have for thousands of years. my dad's and mom's warm smiles. my brother's hugs and jabs. my home. my partners gentle hands and arms. and dreams returning. of building indigenous led and presence active maps. a two-spirit powwow on menominee and surrounding relative homelands. effort, effort, effort. breathing breathing breathing........ breath

inhaling

exhaling

and again

rest and rise

again

as long as i needed

one class, returning to my tribe's tribal college

familiar faces. some who knew what was up at varying degrees

home

aunts and relatives working together in different parts of Wisconsin for this powwow alongside one another.

a healing and creative center, with laughter, deep breaths of effort and release and laughter. aunties, sisters, people to learn more about and share with, our lives offering to one another, bit by bit.

and

Passings. Final breaths in human forms.

two sudden who's had happened sudden and (what would be considered) early for their lives.

and my grandma's. second grandma who was now starting her journey into the sky. weeks working through it with us at her side. hand squeezes. gruff remarks with spunk. soft whispers and words wrapped in love. dreams. and dancing with aunty and cousins in the other room, something grandma loved to do. and then, as we all settled, she left. ready

we breathed and cried

continued working.

continued efforting

continued being and having to try to breath sometimes. not always easy to do

And through this and more that's been in the works. art. freelance work at a Native Museum in Chicago (alongside a community member/mentor/ relative, and my lil bro). practicing humbleness. financially poor. still making art and trying to work. trying to do more yoga again. meditation. reiki. writing. touching koko earth and water. bit by bit.

i worked on so much this year. I faced this fucking shit with my spirit. away from toxic men and mysogistic impositions. talked with amazing women and aunties who lead our world-some who I love and, yeah still, have messed up with me a few times (such is life). Talked with great men in my life who continue to show up and fucking love bringing potential for our futures (and, yeah, sometimes forget to be there for my masculine energy too but still try). These people continued to be there. They don't always know or know much at all the experience I have as a genderfluid, two-spirit human/relative. neice, relative, loved one. but they've fuckin been there still, bringing me to put in and ride a canoe on our river of origin. providing space and opportunity for me to nurture me as an actress. helping me as a queer human to be a committee leader and relative for a two-spirit powwow in our bowl. and help me as a daughter. they help me become. they're there.

my koko and mom have been with me a lot lately. i broke down the other day after a morning of shining warmth and light from within me and around....koko grandma earth. this womb and heart. her womb and heart.

our womb and heart.

my mom helped me after a major cookie crumble moment for me.

my koko was there, within her arms and back too. her womb and heart.

like me

we lifted each other up

we do every time

so. i'm releasing. learning to release more. share a bit of my heart's work.

i don't always know what i'm doing. nobody does. and that's fucking okay.

im learning to love in a new way for me. a version of myself im growing into

im still healing from childhood.

im still healing from those toxic mens actions and spiritual pain that was violently imposed upon

im healing. im trying. it doesnt always look great if we're talking about colonial ideals of sensibility

im not who i was. im me now. and im continuing to move and flow, just like my name

Waqsepaekaciwen---sparkling/glittering/glistening, sun catching, flowing water

water that holds copper and stones

im flowing

and sometimes there are tight spaces and human made dams

sometimes i squeeze around for awhile

and yet, over and over, my koko stops to visit me as i take a break for a second and rest at the shore with her. she hands me a sandwich from her picnic basket, and i lay my head on her lap, resting and eating.

and then, she kisses my cheek, hugs me, heart to heart, and faces me towards the next direction, the curve of the stream in which there is,

sparkling flowing water

me

and the journey i take alongside all of our peoples - relatives. plants, animals.

lady bugs.

fish.

swans.

mermaids. water spirits. my siblings.

the sky, and ānahkwatak (clouds) sailing by up there.

they tell me, one day, i will touch them and we will fly somewhere again

until then

i know i've got a journey im on in this beautiful stream

my stream.

the life i share with you all

so, im exploring, resting, and learning to change again

i guess i'm saying to myself, and maybe whoever needs to hear it: people, granma earth, will be there. they're already there. reach out, because they have answers you're looking for. pieceing them together when it gets hard, even if you or they don't always realize it. they'll help you rest. and when you're ready, they'll help you rise again. through air, movement, words, and steps. they all have what you're looking for, even if you don't know where it'll lead you

a playlist🌱♫ :

Grow - Tessa Violet

Most of the Time - Jackie Evans

Other Side - Nectar Woode

No Problems - Ginger Root

Prodigal Daughter - Aoife O'Donovan, Allisan Russell

Mothers - Emory Hall, Trevor Hall

spring song - jed and the valentine

Hill to Die On - Rebecca Sugar

Faded Glories - Vincent Diamante

Dragonspine Snow (from "Genshin Impact - Dragonspine" Game) - Jordy Chandra

Something to Lose - Tessa Violet

Threads - Carole & Tuesday

Wild Cat(s) - Jhene Aiko

Younger You - Miley Cryus

Just Like Water - Ms. Lauryn Hill

The Flood - Aurora

Across the Water - Swallows and Crows

Seashell - Ivoris

bumbleebee - camiidae

Naturally - Nectar Woode

🌿