Hello Reader,
The plaque on this cairn shows my very first commissioned artwork. (And quite possibly, it will be the longest lasting!) When I was still in high school, my grandfather asked me to draw a black and white image of a sod house, representative of the dwellings my Doukhobor ancestors lived in when they arrived in Canada in 1899.
Adjacent to the family's farmland (acknowledging the original, indigenous peoples of this region), the cairn is located in the Slavanka Cemetery, where my maternal grandparents and other relatives are buried. It commemorates the Doukhobors, a pacifist group of Christians who faced persecution in their native Russia. They refused to take up arms, even in war, believing that god was within each person and to harm or kill another human was an act against god.
I recall attending some Doukhobor services and events as a child (the delicious array of baked goods like tarts and blintzes!), their a cappella singing (my grandparents are on this recording), but my family was not religious. Still, many of the core beliefs about a "toil and peaceful life" were part of my upbringing.
There's a small shed in the cemetery, meant for warming and gathering. Someone has painted it thoroughly, with a whimsical folk art interpretation of Doukhobor patterns mixed with angel iconography.
Translated from Russian, Doukhobor means "spirit warrior" or "spirit wrestler."
I think many of us are wrestling with our "spirits" right now.
I am appalled by the genocide in Palestine, with each new horror inflicted on a people with nowhere to go.
Events both close to home and far away are affecting all of us. I am thinking deeply about what I'm doing and why. I am holding fast to my core beliefs: in peace, humanity, empathy, and caring for the earth and people.
❤️
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