Hello, it’s been a while and much has happened over the past couple of years. This story begins in February 2019.
It was a very tasking idea, but I thought, “Yes, I can!” And I did. It took much longer then I liked or even could conceive of. But my project is now complete.
When I started I did not know how this would be completed, all I knew was that I wanted to go through thirteen years of my digital photographs and select some of my favorites and put together a collection of books for my art. When it came time to put the books together, I was fumbling for a title, until I read a bit on the Abenaki language. I saw Pastonkik and it’s meaning, In the USA. I thought this would be a wonderful title for this project.
This art collection is not a simple catalogue of art, there is a bit of learning found within the pages. Facts on the species such as, it’s endangered status, where is it found, native to the continent, the given scientific name. Where the Dawn Land People would not be an inhabitant of, or if I could not locate an Abenaki word, I used another tribe’s word, such as if it was a picture taken in Washington State, I used the Lushootseed word.
This project took years to complete because not long after starting the image selecting, we were told that we had to move. Luckily, I had made it through a good amount of pictures by Spring. I stopped all arts and readied our first house purchase to go back on the market after five years of being inhabited by us.
We then drove across the country in our vehicles, with our pets. It was terrible. People were not in masks, going around like Covid isn’t a concern at all to them. There were also too many vehicles on the roads and at camp sites for a country that was suppose to be taking precautions to not die of a respiratory virus. Besides being concerned of the virus and dealing with busy roadways, we had an accident. In Idaho. Where the land is flat. And there were strong winds.
My husband was towing a travel trailer. Do you already know where I am going with this? A Mack Truck, not towing and a 2500 civilian truck zip past us, probably going over 90MPH. The trailer sways, violently, picking up speed as it does. It swings wide left into the left lane, as we were in the right. Next, my husband, youngest child, cats and fish, along with the trailer are now horizontal to all of us. The front end of the truck comes to a crashing stop in the dirt off the right lane. The trailer bumped into the truck bed, the tires went flying and crashing in all directions. Luckily the left lane was empty at this time, and people behind my car was kind enough to leave space, so we did avoid colliding with others.
This happened at sunset, on a Saturday. In Idaho, very few work on Sunday. We had not gotten to a camp site until after 2am. We had to wait until Monday to find out if we can still make the journey towing all that we had with us.
That Monday morning, we pulled into a mechanic’s shop and people looked over the trailer and truck. That trailer had been one incident after another since we purchased it fresh from the ForestRiver factory in 2018. We are told that the trailer was not on the correct axle. It was okay to continue to travel with precautions. We had to go on no matter what. Our middle child was due at college soon, we had papers to sign to buy a house, enroll our youngest into the local school and check-in at work. In August, that travel trailer would be found unusable and our contract with that loan was done.
We had another delay coming. The house we were buying, the sellers did not care that we almost died and did not want to wait one more day. This house was on the market for almost 300 days before we started our house search and put in an offer for the house. We had to loose a day of travel to make our son legally able to sign all the papers for buying the new house in our name. He was out on the east coast because he was attending college. Covid shut the school down and he was bouncing from family and friend houses in the area, until we arrived so he could move back home.
Buying a house unseen can be terrifying or a joyful surprise. When we got here, at first it was nice because it’s a bit isolated. But then we walked in. It looked liked it had not been cleaned in years. The kitchen was covered in grease and dust bunnies were in the oven. There were cobwebs everywhere. The windows and walls, never washed. There was drag lines on the 40(?) year old carpets, indicating that they were at-least vacuumed/washed recently. BUT carpets are like the floor of a swamp, they are always going to be gross once they are used. And the stench of urine filled the musty air.
We took the cleaning supplies from the trailer and got to work before the moving truck arrived. And then plans went into place to start renovations. We currently have worked on the kitchen, it just needs the new flooring to be installed. Our bedroom minus the en-suite, it’s been demoed, time is needed to coincide with a plumber. A fence that still needs to be finished painted. It has rained way too much here for Summer in New England. And the smallest, stinkiest room is being worked on now to become my office. Once that space is done I will be able to unpack more and get to working on my art some.
For the next several years, I will have to be less committed to my art. This house is a lot. There are so many projects that must needs be done inside and out. So, while I will be less active on my print-on-demand shops and sharing pics online, please do not forget about me. Please do continue shopping even tho it’s old art. That pocket change will help to make purchases towards renovations so this house can be pretty, cohesive and easier to manage.
Back to the books.
These images above are a randomly selected page from each book. I know, they are not good phone pictures. There are 18 books in total. So, as I mentioned before the title is, Pastonkik, and it means, In the USA. But what about the subtitles? The cover pictures should give a hint about what you shall see inside. But, here is the list of book subtitles and their meaning:
- Oâos – Wildlife
- Nebi – Water
- Masozial – Fern
- Aki – Land
- Sips – Bird
- Maskejamôgwses – Bug
- Anigen – Vegetation
- Masakil pskwasawômal – ‘Many flowers’; photographs of plants in the wild
- Wijokadwôgan – ‘Helping each other’; this is for the symbiotic plants like mushrooms and mosses
- Abazi – Tree
- Minkôganak – Fruits; wild and garden plants that are fruit bearing
- Abazisak – ‘Small tree’; shrubs and bushes
- Nbizonkikôn – ‘A garden’; plant pictures that I took in flower beds and manicured landscaping
What does, V.2 mean? This is the monochrome book of the subject. With the exception of Anigen, this book is of all the plants (minus the ferns) in black and white. The ferns color and monochrome pictures are in one book, because there were enough to do one small book. There is over 400 photographs of plants that were selected and this is why there are many books in this series. I had to break this genre up a bit more to have the subject more manageable/printable, and less expensive.
So, you have made it this far down into the post. You’re probably wondering where can you purchase these books. Why, at blurb.com. I use Blurb to self-publish my art books. Here is my profile link, blurb.com/user/kimberlyjt. The books’ prices start at $42.24 for the shortest book and increases to $102.89 for the book with the most pictures.
I did have some mishaps with the printing. As you see in the picture at the beginning of this post, some covers are not featuring a full bleed image. Those were the first books to be completed and printed. I was not happy that there was markings on the book covers. I swapped over to full bleed for the next order, and there were no imperfections on the covers. So, this is my warning for customers. The white covers may arrived marked. This is on blurbs print processing end. I could take down the file, change the cover art, resubmit the book file, reorder the book so it can go public OR blurb can do better. I am leaving the file as is.
I did a mistake in one of the books that could not be ignored. I did have to take the file off the server and upload the corrected file and reorder the book. I now have two of the same book, but I do not need both. In the future, I know not when, I will list the first printing of the book somewhere for sale.
I’d like to say that I have always had a heartfelt admiration for the First Peoples of North America.
I wish that there were classes offered through the schools or made part of the general lessons for children to know more about the peoples. Until their lives and way of living and history can be taught more in schools we will have to do some independent reading from some sourceful books and websites.
If you have a tongue and ear for language, there are classes that are offered by some communities. Due to Covid, they could be canceled or held online. I hear that it is better to listen to how the words are spoken by a member of the tribe instead of to try and figure it out for yourself.
It is terrible how governments are still treating the peoples horribly. The general population needs to become more aware of how it is for them. I believe that many think the cowboy and indian war is over and things are fine because there are treaties and policies in place. It is not at all peachy for them. The governments have a habit of ignoring the treaties and doing whatever they want for the benefit of bank accounts. There are many more Indigenous people going missing yearly than any other race. The children were taken away to a boarding school, where they were mistreated, killed and some sent off to other families. Their lands are still being stolen today.
Wherever you can, please help support the Indigenous peoples.
Thank you for taking the time to read all of this. I apologize for such a long blog post. I really don’t speak this much, ever, anywhere. This project was a big deal for me. I do hope people enjoy this book series.
Kimberly
Kimberly J Tilley Photography 