I work in an office that is several hundred feet from my father’s childhood home. I gaze at the same ocean, the same mountains, that my father, grandmother, great-grandmother gazed upon before me. I can hear the echo of their laughter, of their heartache as it calls to me from where I sit. It is healing to weave at my desk as I watch the tide ebb and flow, as I hear the chatter of the sea gulls, the ravens, often spotting seals and killer whales out in the bay. I feel very blessed to be given the chance to weave in this location. As I set my hands in place to weave the weft across the warps, I pause and think… what are my next steps, how do I want to twist the weft, how am I holding my hands, what do I need to accomplish.
As my fingers learn to race across the warp, I feel a peace in my thoughts….did my great-grandmother sit this way, what were her thoughts as she wove, will my fingers ever race as fast as hers did? I often think back to the time of my Great-Grandmother and Grandmother. Of the changes they saw, of the heartache they felt, of lives both richly lived. As our children were taken from their families, she wove. As our language was stolen, she wove. As they tried to take our history, she wove. She wove the histories of the clans into the robes. The histories that they tried to strip from our people. She and so many other Chilkat Weavers wove our history. She put our history in plain sight and gave a gift to the generations that followed her. While they tried to silence our voices our Chilkat Robes still danced and still dance to this day, because they wove.
It is an honor and privilege to learn the skills of my Grandmothers. To learn from Marsha Hotch, as she tells Gwen and I the stories of our people, of our grandmothers. As I place my hands into the warp and my fingers grab the weft, I can’t help but say a small prayer….May my hands learn the skills of my Grandmothers before me, so that I too may weave the history of our people.
