Imaginal Journal
Imagination is Medicine
20th Century Women
Loved Mike Mill's portrait of his mother and their relationship in this film. Makes me think of how loneliness can bring people together in solidarity and kinship.
KinShip
And so it is. Over eight years ago I saw this ship on the cover of a first edition of Gabriel Garcia Marquez' One Hundred Years of Solitude. I knew then I wanted this as a tattoo but it wasn't until debilitating injuries forced me to forge a new path and uncover my own myth when I finally read the book cover to cover on a trip to Mexico before I started grad school. This year my entire family were able to return together to Mexico, it also marks ten years since my abuelita Brigida passed. This ship with no sails is symbolic of the legacies that move from generation to generation and the magical stories engendered to make sense of it all.
Run Sister Run by Cass McCombs
"Run Sister Run" by Cass McCombs from the album 'Mangy Love'
Director: Rachael Pony Cassells
Run Sister Run director’s statement:
"The video for Run Sister Run was made in collaboration with young Indigenous leader, activist and athlete Tracie Léost and her family. Run Sister Run brought to my mind thoughts of great female athletes ¬ their discipline, strength and accomplishment, the ritual of preparation before a race. Running can be a powerful political act and tool for change. I remember Australian Aboriginal runner Cathy Freeman’s 2000 Olympic win and victory lap carrying both the Australian and Aboriginal flag and how much impact that one run had (and the great controversy that ensued questioning her right to carry the Aboriginal flag at The Olympics which only recognized the Australian national flag.) Listening to Run Sister Run, I remembered reading an article a friend had forwarded me about Tracie’s solo 115km Journey of Hope run for Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women in Canada last year. Her run was a rally cry against then Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s repeated denial of a proposed public inquiry into MMIW in Canada. She was to me the embodiment of the archetype of the runner as messenger and therefore as protector. Her strength and determination is very inspiring. I remembered reading about Tracie’s feet being shredded from blisters on the first day of her run and how she kept going by running a day in traditional moccasins to allow her blisters to heal. I contacted her and asked if I she would re¬trace her run’s path for the Run Sister Run video. She agreed and is such a natural leader, she also became my location producer, enlisting her whole family to help. We filmed her from her mom’s truck with her mom driving. Her grandfather built a perfect rig to further steady my camera from hay bales and blankets and rode along in the car while we filmed. We stayed at her grandparents house for the first leg of filming, the Métis flag featured in the video was in their yard. Tracie’s father joined us for the Winnipeg leg of the filming so we had almost all of her original Journey of Hope support and logistics crew involved in helping me re¬create her journey for the video. The history of women running in film contains so many images of women filmed from behind, running in fear filmed from the p.o.v of an attacker. It was important to me to not add to the visual history of women running in fear and only film Tracie running forward towards the camera looking forward, her body fearlessly re¬claiming public space."
Below
In response to this time in our social-political climate, I am diving into the night, pooling energy, feeling the collective and intimate pulse that is below.
I am ready to move forward and do all I can to support healing and awareness in this world. And when I say I am with Her, I mean the planet, and the Her in every human being that carries the secret hurt in their feminine nature felt sense/intuition/body/emotion, that has been subjugated by a culture of patriarchal distorted values and immature polarized thinking. Since a majority of our collective psyche has chosen to face the shadow of consumerism/greed, narcissism, sexism/misogyny, racism, classism, religious intolerance, homophobia, and xenophobia in this leader, I welcome this temporary guest to show us what it truly means to uprise for the otherness in ourselves and integrate what we have long rejected within and projected onto others. We have been initiated to see how every American feels marginalized and deepen into that compassion and complexity to write a new mythology that supports global responsibility and unity for the human narrative of truth, hope, justice, and equality to thrive.
