STORIES / Okara’shòn:’a
Ground ivy
This was the first time I felt a true connection with plant medicine. The plant heard what I was thinking and was ready to help. It made the cultural teachings more real: 'All our relations.'
Echinacea, Boneset & Yarrow
Echinacea has pink flowers and looks beautiful in your garden. You can make tea with the flowers and leaves for your immune system. However, it is the roots that are most powerful as an immune booster.
Going with Tradition
There’s a festival called the medicine ceremony. You take the seeds that you’re going to plant and you bring them to the Longhouse. You pass around the medicine and you drink it through your body.
A heavy job
I used to do readings for people. When people have problems, like if they’re scared that somebody is sick in their family, they would come to see me.
Working on bones
My grandmother used to work on bones. Not broken ones because broken ones are very hard to heal but she would work on their muscles.
Motherwort
Motherwort is very bitter. When a plant is bitter, it helps the blood, liver, endocrine system, and female reproductive system.
Women’s health
I like to mix my flowers, my vegetables, and my medicines together in the garden. I grow motherwort, which is a bitter herb.
Dawned on me
I always remember how it started. I was working, it was very shady during those summer days. And all of a sudden, it dawned on me, what I wanna be.
