“The most common way for people to give up their power is by thinking that they don’t have any” – Alice Walker (epigraph, The Break)
Photo by Brendon Thompson on Unsplash
Katherena Vermette’s book, The Break, is real. Curled in my reading chair with one of my mother’s scrap quilts wrapped around my legs drinking Darjeeling Green Tea (so smooth), I am struck by how real the characters are. It is woven with the perspectives of many people. Although the book feels like it is about the strength of women and community and love, I found it interesting that the only two male characters that are developed reflect Canada now. The relations between colonials and First Nations are taking the headlines from speech by Justin Trudeau in front of the UN General Assembly to committees for residential schools and missing and murdered indigenous women. The two police officers, Officers Scott and Christie, are the two sides of that story.
Officer Christie is a personification of beliefs that seem to pull at current affairs. When he first shows up in the story, he is bored, curt and uninterested. To him, it is just another “nates” fighting “nates” story. Through Christie, I can hear conversations in coffee shops and around lunch tables as Canadians in cities and towns speak about the First Nation headlines: higher than average suicide rates; higher than average drug and alcohol addictions; run down housing communities; social assistance-ne’er-do-well. Christie is mild prejudice shows in his lack of effort to investigate the events. He refers to his partner, Tommy Scott, as May-tee. I can hear him saying something like, “I am the least racist person in the world. Look, I like the guy.”
And Tommy Scott, is First Nations. He is trying to fit in to the colonial world. His wife wants to embrace the Pomp and Circumstance of Indigenous pageantry, without seeing the underbelly. Tommy is learning to speak up. He shyly indicates his heritage on his employment forms. He is conscious of how he presents himself to his superiors and his colleagues. It is through Tommy’s perseverance that Christie begins to listen. He begins to hear the story that is playing out through the crime. He steps in and helps.
Is this the story of Canada?
The Break’s storyline is a fictional depiction of Trudeau’s speech:
“Our efforts to build a better relationship with Indigenous Peoples in Canada are not only about righting historical wrongs. They are about listening, and learning, and working together. They are also about concrete action for the future. The reconciliation we seek has lessons for us all. We can’t build strong relationships if we refuse to have conversations. We can’t chart a more peaceful path if the starting point is suspicion and mistrust. And we can’t build a better world unless we work together, respect our differences, protect the vulnerable, and stand up for the things that matter most…” (http://bit.ly/2EhJFUj)
