One of the comments I received in response to the invitation letter I included was a recognition of the near impossibility of finding “pots or vessels whose origin stories you know: where the tree grew before it was cut down and by whom and who the carver was that fashioned it into the bowl or where the clay was dug and who fired it and how it came to you“. Because this was going to be a huge challenge for some and an impossibility for others wasn’t it likely to bring up deep shame and shouldn’t we soften the letter so that people don’t begin excluding themselves?

I’m grateful for that awareness. To be transparent my own seeds are germinating inside a plastic seed tray – which was all I had available at the moment I had to make a choice to either put the 5 dried chile peppers into the compost or do something different with them. So in no way am I judging anyone for their capacity to meet that request. Instead, my most sought-after response would be to tend to that seed of grief for myself and anyone else like me who doesn’t have access to a vessel of known origins for how far away from our indigenous roots we have come. And to bring that tended grief with us to share when we first gather.