Hello friends.

Thank you, Gareth, for always holding such kind and warm spaces for connectivity, reflection, and growth – your SPARKs, my friend, are many and they shine ever bright. I am grateful to have been invited to the conversation, and am excited to share with you, my SPARK.

Hindsight is 20/20, a once witty phrase now loaded with the weight of the catastrophic COVID-19 year and a bit. How strangely fitting that the year the world required us to sit and reflect just so happened to be 2020? I know it was challenging, and my prayers were with you; I truly hope despite it all, you and your circles are safe and well.  Like many, throughout the last 16 months of solitude I had the opportunity to reflect on my health, relationships, passion, and direction.

Although this particular story on my journey to self discovery, growth, acceptance, and love began before the COVID-19 pandemic, recent news prompts me more than ever to share my story of reclamation, and reconciliation. I hope you can reflect with me on my journey and employ my narrative as an illustrative tool to be utilized as a call to action for moving forward together in a good way. I encourage you to take your own reflective journey as you walk with me, and to meet yourself with kindness, and empathy as we learn together. Taught to me first by a close advisor and mentor, Elder Kerrie, the importance of introductions, speaking from the heart, and authentically sharing my story.

My name is Reagan Markwell, and I am a Metis woman of Cree ancestry from Treaty 1 born in Winnipeg, Manitoba. Through my matriline I come from a long lineage of Metis peoples including the Flamand, Ducharme, Chartrand, Lavallee, Alarie, St. Denis, and Ricard families. My father’s side is comprised of many European settler groups; one of my great great grandfathers even helped build the Titanic, a fun family fact that always has friends poking fun at me – obviously—that is why it sank.  Although eloquently written now, the story of my family heritage was far from straightforward, for you see, I was raised unaware of my Indigenous ancestry. Nine years ago, I set out on a personal journey to reclaim my Indigenous, Cree Metis identity.

I am honoured to acknowledge the Indigenous mentors, Elders, and friends who have taught me all that I know today about Indigenous ways of knowing and being; as well as proudly acknowledge the effort and time my family and I have spent searching through lineages, literature, and reconnecting to community. My early teachings of Indigenous ways of knowing came to me from a predominantly Blackfoot perspective on the beautiful Treaty 7 territory, now also known as Calgary Alberta, where I have been raised from a little girl, and am proud to call my home.

The past nine years have been dedicated to defining and re-defining myself, and I continue to grow in confidence and comfort with my current definitions. Still on occasion I doubt myself and can easily reflect on a time where everything seemed unfamiliar. Ungrounded in my identity, defensive, embarrassed, confused, and disconnected. I recognize these now as symptoms of fear, grief, and unknowing. These discomforts encouraged me to trace back my understanding of how racism and colonialism produce the dominant stereotypes our societies see today; moreover, their compounding and intersectional implications on the quotidian experiences of Indigenous peoples through lived and historical experiences of injustice, violence, and alienation. I felt a deep obligation to share in the collective responsibilities that are bestowed to each of us thriving on Indigenous lands, and to provide a historically informed narrative to motivate the reconfiguration, reparations, and renewal required to heal, and to move forward together.

The decolonization of my worldview, and realization of my Indigenous personhood through kind conversations with friends, mentorship from knowledge keepers and Elders, and countlessly entering into learning opportunities with open eyes, open ears, and an open heart illuminated a beautiful and harmonious, interconnected and reciprocal way of knowing and being; moreover, emphasized the responsibilities I feel toward creating safe, ethical, and inclusive spaces for all to learn, and grow together. I realized, I am a steward, an ally, a student, a teacher, a relative, and friend, and I encourage you to realize the same. Feel empowered leaning into some of that discomfort, to dissect your understanding, to ask the questions, and to build the relationships and knowledge to wholly embrace your role and responsibilities as someone who thrives on Indigenous lands. I dare you to enter into empathetic learning, and to walk a parallel path with open eyes, open ears and an open heart, for you are a caretaker of today, tomorrow, and our children’s children’s futures. I am grateful to be on this awakening journey with you.

With love and kindness.

All my Relations,

Reagan Markwell