by Mary M
We are all of us water beings, women especially. And as such, like the whales or the dolphins or especially like the salmon, we are called to make our journeys.
Where do our journeys begin? With our own lives? With our parents’ lives? With our parents’ parents’ lives?
Salmon journeys began…how do we know when? Perhaps these great fish traveled in the water from the sky as the ancestors tell. Or perhaps they began in the well of knowledge where the salmon fed from the hazel nuts, as the Celtic story goes. Or perhaps they lept out of our ancestral dreaming. Salmon are an ancient people and, though much diminished, they are with us still. They are still on their journey and the end of that journey is unknown.
If, as I believe, the salmon’s journey is our journey, and if the salmon’s health is our health, this fish-shaped being has a lot to teach us about ourselves and our communities and about the water that sustains us. All indigenous teachings acknowledge the spirit that resides generally and specifically in all creation. The water is alive, the earth alive, the air alive, the fire alive, and so, those who dwell within these living beings live also. But were we to regard the salmon as a physician would, we might recognize that the Salmon people are in grave danger–and that we are in danger too. But healing begins with a desire to be healed and if we are indeed water beings on a journey, might not our journeys also benefit the journeys of all our kind–human and non?
So these pages are for the alchemy of change. They are for salmon, for water, for the bravery of fish whose journey home occurs in lesser and lesser numbers, against overwhelming odds. Yet still they travel, as do we.
So write about salmon. Dream about salmon. Create dances that praise them. Sing about them also. And contribute your thoughts here so that the alchemy of change for the well being of salmon can grow. Salmon are us. Their journey is our journey–from the waters of home to the ocean of transformation–and as we care for them so we care for ourselves and for our relations.
~~~~~~~~
