They say the best place to start a story is at the beginning, but whose beginning? Where does my real beginning start? With my parents or with my ancestors? Those mysterious, earthy souls.
I sit here in twilight’s glow, having thrown open the window for fresh air. Spring is upon us, but the snow may not be done. You know those late Michigan Winters. Sunny spring-like days, teasing you to come out and play in the bright sunshine, and come nightfall, your breath announces your arrival before you do.
I want to call my grandmother. Or maybe my grandfather, to ask him if he’s ever heard the call of the hawk. Has he ever been stopped in his travels, by a buck so big you think it’s a figment of your imagination. The stag story is for another day, another time.
I’m an urban Indian woman. Not typical, generally speaking – or stereotypically anyway. Amongst the people I work with, I stand out because of the color of my skin and these weird green eyes and frizzy brown hair. Even growing up I was just outside the circle too.
I wondered where I fit in back then. Sometimes, I still wonder where I fit in, but now it’s more like, what the hell am I going to do with the rest of my life now that my job is on the down slide and I have a wide open road in which to travel. Exciting, yet a little scary.
Back to the hawks. Do the other “urbans” hear them singing? Every other bird is doing its thing, cars honk in the distance, and you hear the kids down the way laughing as they play outdoors. Then I hear it. That shrill that catches my attention and draws my eye to the expansive blue skies. It’s a reminder somehow, I think.
They don’t tell you that no matter how far away you think you are from your heritage, it calls you back somehow. You’re always connected. Maybe it’s cellular memory. I honestly don’t know.
Hell, maybe it’s a mid-life crisis. Hitting 40 years old now. Maybe that’s why they call those after pow wow parties ‘49ers’. It’s your last big party before the big 5-0. Maybe hearing those hawks cries singing is my mid-life identity crisis.
I could call Grandma. But you know, the phone lines only go one way to heaven.
Modern day smoke signals. This here PC. I’m blowing that smoke now. Maybe I should smudge this old computer. Maybe that would help take this conversation to where it needs to go. God knows I’ve said my prayers daily, especially with my eldest boy in the service fighting for his country.
The hawk’s cry catches my attention. The hawks are singing their sky song. And I think of my sun who is a warrior now. Yes, I said my sun, because I have a sun over there. He is my sunshine during these gray days of war and uncertainty. And his letters from the Middle Eastern deserts somehow quench this worried mom – even if the news is two weeks old, sometimes older.
The thing is, no matter where I fit in the scheme of this lifetime, whether the hawks are singing or the deer are sending me messages, I’m still a mother with a son deep in the warring deserts of Iraq. His life is in danger on a daily basis, along with several hundred thousand other young men and women.
My ancestry calls me back from time to time. Sending little love notes on the wind that I am welcome home anytime. But the world is so much bigger now, yet so close to each and every one of us.
What a feeling that evokes. That endless circle of life. This earth we call home to so many people sharing her resources. And what makes my brown skin different than the desert brown skins across the ocean, is that we were born in different countries. But we are all mothers, sisters, fathers, brothers. And we all come from the same place. Our mothers and fathers.
Honor diversity. Thank God for diversity. And pray for peace. It doesn’t have to end this way.
Found notes: Early Spring 2003
Field Notes 
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