I left home, a small Ojibwa community in Central Ontario, way back in 1980. The reason? College, and a desire to see if there was more to life than country music, mosquitoes and bologna. Twenty-six years later, I'm returning home. Much has changed in that intervening time -- both in my community and in myself.
When I left home, I was young, impressionable, trying to understand the appeal of disco and about 20 pounds lighter. Now, I'm older, still impressionable, trying to understand the appeal of rap -- and the less said about my weight the better.
I know I'm old. I read The Globe and Mail and listen to CBC Radio faithfully. That's more accurate then flashing your birth certificate.
That said, I have decided that after all this time, life in Toronto holds no more mystery for me. I've done the restaurants, the theatres, the bars, the museums and the transit system. I've travelled the world, published 17 books, expressed myself in half-a-dozen forms of media and had my heart broken a few times. I love the city, but let's face it, the novelty has worn off. Now, the salmon must return home to spawn -- well, perhaps that's not the best metaphor to use.
I have been thinking of Brian Maracle's wonderful book Back on the Rez, in which he describes the trial and tribulations of an Urban Indian taking up residence back "home."
I was born a Rez Indian, became an Urban Indian and will return home an Urbane Indian. I wonder if the transformation can work in reverse.
When I left all those years ago, I thought I'd never return -- the anger of youth and all. Damn it, there was a world to be explored out there.
Since then, I've chased kangaroos in Australia, got drunk with Finnish university students, battled sandstorms in northern China, sampled asparagus ice cream in Germany, got seasick in Cuba, stuck my finger in a bullet hole left by Pancho Villa in the ceiling of a cantina in Mexico City, seen plays in London's West End and swum in the water off the coast of Sicily while trying to avoid the jellyfish.
Two years ago, I was in India on my mother's birthday, and e-mailed her via my aunt, wishing her many happy returns and saying that I'd just taken a tour of a city called Jaipur, where I'd seen camels, monkeys and elephants walking the streets.
My aunt e-mailed me back saying that for her birthday, my mother's sisters took her to a nearby garbage dump to watch the bears.
I'm going to have to reconcile these two realities. Still, I'm sure the people of Jaipur would find bears and a reserve garbage dump equally fascinating.
In the end, much of my concern comes down to food. I now find myself preferring mortadella to bologna, and I wonder if that will be a problem -- it doesn't fry as well. I don't know if that makes me elitist or what.
Over the years, I've become quite fond of international cuisines. I have it on fairly good authority that that bulgoki and kimchi are difficult to find back home on the reserve. That could be due to the noticeable lack of Koreans. Evidently there's just as little decent Thai, Greek and Vietnamese food there.
I will have to trade in lemon grass for sweetgrass. Maybe I'll learn to make bologna tartare.
Either way, I'm going home this summer. Granted, I used to go there every four or six weeks to visit family, but there is a noticeable difference between visiting and taking up residence. For instance, noted Cree playwright and author Tomson Highway was born in Brochet, Man., near the Northwest Territories. Today, he spends half the year in a cottage in the south of France. He was once quoted as saying, "I don't do Canadian winters any more."
I envy him. A small part of me would love the opportunity to return to a small island I found off the coast of Fiji. As a writer in the Internet age, it's not impossible -- though my writing could lose its authenticity. Instead of Molson's Canadian, my characters would end up drinking kava, the narcotic drink Polynesians imbibe made from the roots of an island plant. Again, not a lot of kava on my reserve.
But while I have gone out to the world, the world has come to my reserve as well. When I went to China a few months back, I asked some cousins what they wanted me to bring them back. Uniformly, they all asked for green tea. I was amazed and brought back as much as I could. I don't even drink green tea.
So maybe the move won't be so traumatic. There's a place down the road from where I'll be living that actually makes pizza from scratch -- sort of an aboriginal version, I guess. When I order, I'll have to tell them to hold the Spam.
It's green at home. Very green. Lots of bugs too. Can't forget the relatives who know everything you are doing, even before you do. But it's home. The pace is slower. Stress definitely lower. And I've got a lovely house surrounded by several acres of trees to hide in, in case the going gets tough.
So maybe it won't be all bad. I have purchased an authentic Chinese/Korean cookbook. My satellite dish will keep me more informed, with all the TV stations in Newfoundland or Alberta, than Toronto cable ever could. And next November I'm scheduled to go to a conference in Vienna to lecture on native people in North America (I'm sure my reaction was the same as yours) -- and in the new year, Poland.
And who knows, maybe in those countries, saying I live on a reserve will make me seem a lot more exotic and interesting than saying I live in a split-level bungalow in Toronto.
Drew Hayden Taylor is a playwright, humourist and filmmaker from Curve Lake First Nation, near Peterborough, Ont.