Anishinaabe Medicine Journey
Entering Saskatchewan “Land of Living Skies” after a long drive
I embarked on a journey across Canada in search of a place to call home. I carried this longing quietly for many years — a pull in my spirit to return, to remember, to set my roots down in a way that felt true. I left the west coast, where I had lived for more than half my life, and travelled back toward my territory in Ontario, believing the land itself would recognize me and receive me.
This journey was not just geographic. It was ceremonial. Each mile carried prayers, grief, hope, and unanswered questions. I was seeking belonging — not only to a place, but to myself as an Anishinaabe woman shaped by displacement, survival, and resilience. I listened closely to the land, to the water, to the silence between stops, trusting that spirit would guide me where I needed to be.
Yet, I did not find the home I was searching for.
What I found instead was truth. I learned that home is not always waiting in the way we imagine. Sometimes the land reflects our wounds back to us before it offers rest. I encountered unresolved histories, fractured relationships, and the weight of colonial disruption that still lives in families and communities. The ache I carried did not dissolve — it spoke louder.
This journey taught me that medicine is not always comfort. Sometimes medicine is clarity. Sometimes it is grief. Sometimes it is the understanding that belonging is something we must rebuild, piece by piece, within ourselves before it can exist anywhere else.
Though I did not set my roots down in that place, the journey was not a failure. It was an initiation. A remembering. A reminder that my spirit knows the way, even when the destination changes. I continue to walk, carrying the teachings, trusting that home is still forming — in the land, in community, and within my own becoming.
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