Geeeez cuzzin, reminiscing on these past three years, The Great Purge of May 2021 (an upcoming story) was right rough for your Blackfoot Bro. It was my lowest point. My rockiest bottom. I was locked in perpetual hindsight.
You know how when your heart hurts so bad, in that moment you think it's gonna last forever? That's the feeling. When you reminisce, and regret, over and over and over again. That's the feeling. You end up so far down the rabbit hole, there aren't even any rabbits there. That's the feeling.
My live-in girlfriend had just left me, with only a note, at the height of the pandemic. I was blindsided and devastated.
I'm woefully weeping at Chocolate Lake in Kjipuktuk (Halifax) … with my big bag of Chocolate Kush, chugging a chocolate milk that tastes far beyond its expiration date. The early morning sun shines on my chocolate braids and my chocolate tears and my chocolate skin and the chocolate chip freckles on my arms.
It's just another manic Monday - I wish it was Sunday, 'cause that's my fun day, my "I-don't-have-to-run" day - but, no, I was officially alone for the first time in my life, far from my homelands, in unceded Mi’kmaq territory. I'm stuck in a loop, a furious fixation, imagining the endless echoes of my now 2/3 empty house. Will my cries of despair ricochet from wall to wall to wall?
Since I knew no one locally, I reached out to the social media masses, I asked for help ... four simple words: “I need a friend.”
… and a Maritime angel reached back1
She said: "Stay right there, you shouldn't be alone."
She arrived in 5 minutes, in a tiny grey 4 door with 3 hubcaps ... 'cause that's what angels drive.
She's a complete stranger, I’m an incomplete soul, we've never met, so I try not to look too distraught. I fail miserably.
She jumps out of her angel-mobile and says: "I just had my covid test, it's negative, can I hug you?" It was then I realized ... I can't even speak anymore.
She hugs me for a minute straight, or maybe it was an hour, it's exactly what I need.
She drives me to the ocean, and just lets me ugly cry and war cry and wimper cry for 5 hours, it's exactly what I need.
She brings me back from my brink, it's exactly what I need.
She sacrifices her precious time for a struggling stranger, it's exactly what I need.
She dropped me off with a whole new appreciation for this paradise I call home, it's exactly what I need.
I never saw her again ...
Where I'm from - the Blackfoot Confederacy - she would be considered a new sister. Us Blackfoot are big on honoring those who selflessly help others, we have entire ceremonies for it and everything.
In the years since, many more Maritime angels reached out, to: share a meal, collaborate on books, shoot the breeze, have our kids hang together, have a BBQ, go kayaking, stay in their seaside cabin, go deep sea fishing, pick fruit in their orchard, drink wine from their vineyard, practice martial arts, catch a mellow buzz together ... and so on and so on. Love and thanks to each and every one of them guys and gals, for reaching back.
I no longer feel alone, I no longer long for my homelands.
... and that's how a Maritime angel saved my sanity, with a hug
Always reach out. You're surrounded by angels.