I saw an incredible movie the other night called Frybread Face. It was a simple story of a young boy who got dropped off at his grandmothers for a few weeks while his mom sorted out her divorce. It was a snapshot of a time and place in his memory. It was a celebration of this memory and a tribute to his grandmother as I saw it. A family of Native American / Indigenous peoples each so rich in character with so much depth. The Grandmother has been in my mind. Her posture so upright still calm and proud. Her weaving of rugs and the methods and meaning in them. Her acceptance of others in her family her wise words and open arms. I didnt have this. I had one grandmother who was a broken soul. She wore black and she was always holding her head in her hand. She had fled Austria while her parents and other family were sent to concentration camps and exterminated. She went blind and never spoke much to me at all except once in a while she would say, “Alyssa come give me a kiss” in her thick Greman accent. Before she went blind she would make me chicken and I used to talk about it in my stand up….She’d say…. I made you chicken mit butter und carrots mit butter und cake mit butter und shnitzel vis butter und butter vis butter …it was artery abuse. She was unaware of the physical and metal abuse her daughter, my mother, was inflicting on me and how I hurt in every way. My other grandmother was the wife of a mobster, my grandfather. She wasnt part of my life. Id see her very rarely at her house in Long Island. There was candy everywhere and she called me tootsie. She too ignored the criminal behaviors of her husband and also of her kids, my father. My father took me to see her in the hospital just before she died and all she said was…”Stop looking in the mirror. You’re beautiful”. And that was it. I wonder “why” alot about alot of things. I often just wind up saying to myself, return to your breath and let it go. The wisdom Ive longed for has come from the Native Indigenous peoples teachings Ive read about like all life being sacred. The wind, the moon, the sun, the directions, laughter, the animals, trees, all of it, sacred. And then Buddhism taught to me by Thich Nat Han. About returning to my breath, being present, looking deeply into all things, and learning to let go. I sometimes see him sitting in meditation next to me guiding me telling me to let it go. In these teachings I found my wise and loving “Grandmother”. I just wish I could feel her loving embrace. Years ago I drove across the country from NY to LA. I was excited to get to Flagstaff AZ and meet Indigenous people there. I thought I would meet someone there and they were going to tell me my name. I had never connected to my name since it was givin to me by a woman, my mother, who told me how much she hated me all the time. When I heard my name there was no love in it and no identity and fear. I thought I would meet a wise Indigenous person who would see me, feel me, and understood things about me and my spirit and I would be givin a new name. When I arrived I did see and meet Indigenous people however they were not in a good way. They were drunk or experiencing hurts of their own. I had this fantasy about it all but seeing the reality was sobering. I bought some gorgeous pottery there and got on my way. I cherish the pottery I got there, when I look at it I feel connected to the soul of it, to the beauty of it.Thich Nat Han said, “To know great joy is to know great suffering. To know great suffering is to know great joy.” Heres to those of us who are here trying to turn our suffering into something beautiful that brings joy. Peace xo