on haida gwaii
I’m writing from a remote island in the northern pacific, one different and far from Pico but nonetheless offering reminders of my own land time and time again.
We’re here because James had been asked to photograph the ancient cedar forest that exists on Xaayda Gwaay.yaay1 Haida Gwaii and nowhere else. When he told me he was headed there, I cashed in some chips and said “We’re coming with.” We flew to Vancouver from Denver then took a small prop plane to Sandspit, then a ferry to the northern island and a car 45 minutes to Tllall. We’re staying in a beautiful resort that’s closed for the season, so I’ve got a sink and an air fryer and four dessert size plates to make all of our meals with. The grocery stores are quite like what we find where I live in rural Montana. It’s a challenge and invigorating.
The ice age passed this particular island and resulted in some species unique to this place alone. Particularly the black bears, the biggest on the globe, so full on the abundance of fish that run in the streams that they care not for you. I’ve yet to see one but the otter greeted me on arrival, a good omen.
I will not try to describe the beauty of the forest, nor could any phone even begin to capture the way light moves through such deep time. I stood before an 800-year-old cedar and let the words spill out of me, nonsensical, excited, shaky. My three-year-old son knew better how to handle the situation, immediately developing a story with the ancestor and refusing to leave even after an hour of play at its base.
The Haida Nation is sovereign, one of two First Nations tribes in Canada with this “status”. There are about 4,500 people on the island, half of which are Haida. Taan Forest, who James is working with, is the Haida Nation’s company that manages the land use. Yesterday we were guided by one of their engineers who explained: 51% of the trees are protected and no one is ever allowed to touch them. 32% is managed under a 1,000 year plan for ethical and cultural sustainability. This plan began in 2011. “It’s going pretty well,” said the engineer when I asked about its first 14 years.
Some cedars are designated “CMTs” — culturally modified trees. An example was the mass of cedar we were shown, deep in the forest on a hilly interior, that had several wedges removed, burn marks, and visible adz cuts. Someone was determining whether or not the colossal would serve well as a canoe. Ultimately rejected, nearby was the stump of the chosen log. The top revealed a smooth chiseling, nothing like a chainsaw. A few meters away lay the felled tree, the canoe in progress, now overgrown with the rampant mosses and plants that overtake every living and dead surface here. Work on the canoe, the engineer explained, was likely abandoned around 1860 when smallpox took out a great many Haida. The project was stranded, though the proof of effort remains.
Other trees are designated “monument trees”. These have specific qualifications that Haida people seek out for poles, canoes, lodge houses and more. These trees are harvested and put in a special pile, which a Haida person can then come and make a selection from. The tree cannot be sold or used for anything else, no matter how long it remains in the pile.
On every sign is Haida first then English. There are only 200-300 speakers of the language, but it is given priority at every turn. This is my second trip to Canada in a few months, seventh in life. Each time I’m struck by the recognition of the First Nations, often in this manifestation — street signs. Place names. Designations. (As an aside, this makes me think of my favorite book, Wisdom Sits in Places by Keith Basso. Cannot recommend highly enough.) Seeing the language foreign to me and a great many others shoots the words directly into the heart. The inability to comprehend or even sound out bypasses the brain entirely, but it becomes lodged within.
The deep forest teleports me back to Pico, my grandmother’s volcanic island in the middle of the Atlantic. The dark cold, the birdsong unlike any other, the fungi, the layers of forest floor that consume you. My heart longs for forest, I type out while in its midst. For a lack of illumination and only questions in the face of profuse growth.
There is a woman in São Caetano who is my bridge. She is almost 90 and is the only person on the planet who has held both my hand and my great-great-grandmother’s. “I was 15 when she died,” she told me the first time we met. “It is important not to die alone, and because I was the neighbor I was available.” She sat next to the old woman’s bed for hours, holding her hand, waiting. Rosa’s eyes watered in front of me as she recollected. “May I hold your hand?” I asked, and she took mine.
There is a knowledge inside of me that Senhora Nunes will soon die herself, and any earthly connection to my ancestors will be gone with her. When Covid hit, I thought for sure she would go. But it is six years and three visits I’ve been able to spend with her, each one shorter as her energy wanes. I have a rush in me, gettoPicogettoPicogettoPico before she leaves.
It’s pretty simple, the Haida say. Take only what you need. Give back all that you can. Make plans beyond your lifetime. Beyond your children’s children. At the base of the great cedar, my eyes well. All I see are bridges.