Using my new year’s resolution to free my tree, and myself, from the bondage of colonization

This First Person column is the experience of Marina Commanda Westbrook, an Anishinaabekwe who lives in Ottawa. It was originally published in January 2022. For more information about CBC's First Person stories, please see the FAQ.

As I took the decorations off my artificial Christmas tree and put them away, I found myself mulling over new year's resolutions. At this time of year, we are called to reflect on life; how we can improve or be a better human in some way. I've been inspired by this tradition, but lately it's been more about how I can leave Mother Earth in a better place than I inherited it, like the one my ancestors thrived in for millennia.

Four years ago, my daughter convinced me that we could enjoy the season much longer with a pre-lit "pretend" tree. Honestly, as I'm sure others can relate, I've vacuumed up tree needles in July, so … the tree came home with us.

That first year, the tree shone in all its artificial, glowing glory. There were about 500 lights on it, but I found myself still missing the spirit of my real tree. I kept that to myself for the sake of a longer sparkling season.

Couldn't throw it away

Three Christmases later, the tree didn't seem so happy and neither did I. After hours of trying to find the elusive bulb that was causing most of the lights to not work, I caved. I strung new lights around it, added the decorations and tried to overlook the unlit bulbs and wires for the season. The no-longer pre-lit tree would have to sadly make its way to the curbside at the end of season.

But when it came time to toss, I just couldn't do it. In the past, I've tried to do something meaningful with my new year resolutions. I've given up buying any kind of plastic packaging. Admittedly, that was a big life adjustment, but with some thought I replaced the plastic wrap, baggies and containers with wax paper, glass containers and paper bags and I haven't looked back.

"What else can I do?" I pondered, as I took the decorations off my tree, which was still tightly production-wrapped in wires and broken lights. Admittedly, I felt it was such a waste that this otherwise decent tree's fate was to lay in a landfill site for the next 500-plus years.

These trees carry a lot of weight — not just the decorations. The tradition harkens back hundreds of years. And so, there's nothing wrong with this pretend tree that tries so hard to fulfil its purpose, except the lights don't work and the wires still bind the branches and weigh them down.

Inspired by this thought, with coffee and scissors in hand, I started to remove the broken lights.

Carefully handling each branch, I snipped away at the wires and started feeling for this tree. With each snip and painstaking unwinding, I recognized that I was releasing the tree from the bondage of appearance and glitter. Even as I thought I got them all, a closer look showed wires that still refused to let go. In the end, I was left with what I estimate to be 30 metres of wire and broken bulbs.

This line of thought led me back to my childhood. Fifty years ago, our family had a shiny, silver aluminum tree wound with lights that my dad carefully checked and replaced, year after year. Even though the tree I'm attempting to rescue is bigger and has far more lights, it doesn't compare to the memory of my childhood one. I'm not sure what happened to that tree, but my guess is that it's resting and forgotten in the earth somewhere.

How many other pretend pre-lit trees face the same fate? How many owners would take the time to remove the bondage of wire and let the branches free? What do they give back once their glittery lives end?

Some may think that replacing a natural tree with a pretend one saves the natural ones from an early unnatural death or is better for the environment; however, the teachings of my family name have helped me to understand otherwise.

As an Anishinaabekwe, I am most at home among my mitig (tree) relatives. So when one is brought into my home, I feel like I'm welcoming family. I live by the beliefs and values that I've been taught: that I have a relationship with everything around me — the flying beings, the growing beings, the swimming beings, the four-legged beings and the rooted beings. They are all my relatives and without them, without their support, I would not be able to survive. So when I welcome one into my home, it is as a relative whom I love, respect and cherish.

The experience of freeing my pretend tree from the wire bondage that held it made me reflect on this custom and has led to my new year's resolution: Instead of buying another artificial tree pre-bound in the wires that have come to represent to me the bonds of colonization, I will welcome my mitig relatives into my home and dress them honourably and brightly.

My pre-colonization family name is Mkishinaatik, meaning "Rotten Wood." When I first learned the meaning of my family name, I wondered, "Why was my family known by this strange name that sounded so unpleasant?"

I carried this question for many years before a kind and knowledgeable Kokum explained the importance of my name. My family became known as nurturers and healers because, without the rotting wood, nothing would ever grow again. The medicines given up by the wood as it returns to the earth allows the next generation to flourish. I was filled with pride when I received this teaching and I say "Chi miigwetch, Kokum" for this truth.

And so, I will put away my now unbound tree, branches relieved from their burden and give it another season to honour its natural peers. But the time will come when I will once again welcome my mitig relative home and dress her in the memories of my family. Then I will celebrate her return to the earth after the season of celebration and allow her the opportunity to give medicine to the generations to come.

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