ThinkPint2

Greta put her thumbprint next to her door and was securely checked in for the evening. She told Anota she would meet her in the lobby at 6 and settled in to make herself at home. Greta grabbed her photo album which had Rt. 66 in her own distinctive artwork on the cover and went downstairs ready to meet Anota and whoever else would show.

Anota was already there when she arrived and was talking with another woman who had a P.S. Gathering, April 10-14 badge. Greta made her way to them, a little sheepishly, but now that she was here, she wanted to make the most of it.

“Greta, I’d like you to meet Akitla, her ancestors are Inuit and originally lived in the Arctic, about as far away as you can get from my ancestors, but we already realize how much we have in common.”

“Common, in what way?” Greta asked Akitla, a woman who appeared to be about the same age as both she and Anota.

“We both had to change our lives drastically because of water–in my case water that had been snow and ice, and in Anota’s case water that rose too high over the land,” Akitla said without a hint of shyness, but direct and clear. “Are you from a coastal area, Greta?”

“No, land is my background, and far away from coasts, which has been both good and bad.”

Small talk, that was really big talk ensued for another 15 minutes and gave Greta the chance to begin to understand the Inuits who came from Alaska, Canada, Greenland, and Russia and were called Eskimos by their neighbors, which meant ‘eaters of raw meat.’ They call themselves Inuit, meaning ‘real people.’ They are the indigenous people who inhabited the Arctic.

“Don’t confuse indigenous people with the others who live in the Arctic zone,” Akitla said very emphatically. In her mind, there certainly was a difference, that was clear.

Anota moved on to meet someone else, but Akitla stayed. Greta asked if she wanted to see any pictures of her ancestor’s land.

“Yes, very much. I brought old pictures as well. Let’s sit down.”

Greta opened her album, and showed Akitla an aerial picture of the farmland she wanted to see in Central Illinois. It was of a farm and grain elevator by the four lanes of Rt. 66.

“I understand only one building remains from the farm and even the grain elevator is gone, but I want to see it. The picture was taken in the 1970’s. My ancestors lived on the farm at the top right of this picture.”

Akitla nodded her head, “I understand, my ancestors use to live in igloos up until about the 1950’s and here is a picture I have of that.”

Greta and Akitla went back and forth with pictures sharing what they knew about people who lived a long time ago. Greta described small farms and farming operations and raising corn and soybeans. Akitla described a hunting life and travel by sled and dogs through ice and snow.

Akitla explained all seemed to change in the 1950’s or 1960’s as Inuit children were sent away to boarding schools; native language lost; and the Inuit people began living in houses.

Greta’s turn came and she described small farms getting larger, corporate farms coming, climate change making more difference in crops that would grow, and then finally becoming climate refugees to the North. Greta went back even further in history describing the prairie grass being changed forever by the plow of her European white settlers as they moved across the continent.

Akitla related breakdown of her community, sea ice cover melting, corporations trying to mine for energy resources, and then permafrost melt happening. The elders had tried early on to warn that it was warming and life was changing. They knew their lands; they knew their animals on it. They warned those who would listen that the Arctic was the barometer for the world, and they were the mercury in it, and the mercury was rising.

Their sea was rising at a much higher rate than the rest of the world because of the conditions in the Arctic. When ice and snow left, the bare earth absorbed more heat and that caused more melting. Campaigns developed around saving polar bears, but no one seemed as interested in saving the people and the way of life of the Inuit who lived in four countries at the polar cap.

Inuit people developed campaigns for their human right to have cold, snow, and ice and continue their culture as it had existed. This existence was tied to nature, unlike what developed on much of the earth over time, which was called ‘growth’. Their voices were heard, but not loud enough to make a difference in the long run.

Akitla described when the Arctic Ocean finally melted year round and the Northwest Passage was entirely clear, thus making new trade routes possible. Those that had been used, like the Suez Canal, were then less profitable. Life changed forever for her peoples as new animals came, not the least of which was the human animal of the corporations who wanted to explore for oil and gas. New crops could be raised; new fish came; but now instead of being hunters, they were mainly workers in the mining industries. Countries were in huge disputes over who had rights to what. Abundantly clear was the peoples who had lived there the longest were treated the worse.

Akitla went on, “And it changed even more when the permafrost melted.”

“Explain please, I remember reading about this but never really understood everything that happened.”

Akitla did the best she could to explain permafrost.

“You understand soil in Central Illinois. Yes?”

Greta shook her head yes, knowing Illinois soil had been the among the richest in the world.

“Well, our soil was rich in carbon, but frozen. When it started to thaw, first the land was unsettled and buildings buckled, but the bigger issue was the carbon and methane released in the atmosphere, which lead to even more warming, and more warming, and more warming–a positive feedback loop is what they call it. And it’s still happening today. It could not be stopped once it was started.”

Greta shook her head and looked down. “Why didn’t ‘they’ do more when they could? I just don’t understand, do you?”

Akitla had no response except a shrug of her shoulders. Throughout the conversation Akitla had called everyone below the Arctic Circle, Southerners. What indeed were the Southerners doing?

When she got back to her room, Greta got out her Rt. 66 or Bust journal. She started by writing this.

April 10, 2064

Today I am sad at being a Southerner….

Then she wrote down the best she could what she learned about the Arctic from Akitla.