Which is why as early as last Monday, I started overthinking Canada Day.
For 34 years of my life, Canada Day has included wearing red and white clothes. It’s included cake given out by Town Hall. It’s included a parade and/or fire works, free live music, a trip to the beach and a BBQ with friends. It’s meant waving the Canadian Flag high and proud. And on the 35th year, I couldn’t even decide what to wear. Is wearing red and white on July 1st suddenly wrong? And what on earth am I suppose to say today, as I and so many Canadians are in the midst of mourning indigenous children across Canada.
I’ve lost track of the number of graves that have been uncovered on former residential school property. In fact, up until a few years ago I hadn’t even heard of a residential school, which I find extremely hard to understand considering I grew up within 20 minutes of Six Nations in south-western Ontario. When I looked up a list of residential schools, there was a school 30 minutes from my home town. I’d never heard of it. No one I came across in my 24 years of living in south-western Ontario uttered it’s name. I took history classes in high school, I took social sciences and in post secondary education I studied Nutrition. Not once did I read about a residential school as part of Canadian history nor did I read one single study that stated the nutrition research I was studying had actually been conducted with children in residential schools. No one told me. And I didn’t know to dig deeper. Now I do.
I cried at the visual of 215 shoes on the steps of St. Ambrose Church. My heart hurts thinking of mothers and fathers who lost their babies to these schools. I think of family members and friends with children who have indigenous bloodlines and I cannot imagine their children being torn away from them. I can’t imagine sitting by and thinking “that’s ok” or “that’s what is suppose to happen”. Yet for over one hundred years, this was allowed to happen. My usual pride on saying “I’m Canadian” is a whole lot quieter this year.
Today – you will not hear me verbalize Happy Canada Day because I am not happy with Canada. It’s July 1st and it’s a holiday. I’m not wearing red and white clothing from top to bottom. I’m not eating cake. And I’m not shouting my Canadian pride over the radio or on social media. My 35th year as a Canadian will be spent a little more somber as I strive to read more, know more and do better then the generations that have gone by.
– Candice
