Prayer Walk for Water and a Nuclear Free Future

When I started writing this, I wanted to share about “reprocessing” nuclear waste, as well as, The West Valley Site and the Prayer Walk . The stories are connected but it's a lot to tell. After getting more than 4 pages and still not covering everything, I thought I should just talk about the water walk experience and share a few links that talk about the site itself. I guess a blog about reprocessing is due next then haha! For now, since Indigenous-Led Nuclear Abolition that honors the earth and respects the place we are based in is the main focus of my work, that's what I will talk about.

As most of you may know, the Fermi Two reactor is on the Western Basin of Lake Erie, and the whole lake is considered an impaired waterway. This recent trip took me to the Eastern Basin of Lake Erie where the Cattaraugus Creek and Seneca Indian Community in Western New York are located. This community in the Seneca Nation has a history like the rest of us indigenous folks here on Turtle Island, a story of removals, survival and resilience, as well as a story of excellence, community and culture. I was invited by Maria Maybee and Shannon Seneca, two Seneca activists and community people working in different ways to protect their lands and get the cleanup that’s much needed. They are also preventing new issues from developing. There were prayers for the land, water, and people to experience healing in a nuclear free-future.

This journey to Seneca lands wasn’t random. I met Maria and Shannon at the Indigenous Environmental Network Protecting Mother Earth Conference (IEN-PME) in Cherokee, North Carolina last year. (I would like to mention that IEN also had some folks show up to support.) We were on a panel together, sharing about the nuclear issues that we work on and we kind of connected around the fact that we were both kinda on Lake Erie and share this waterway. There was more connection around our earth, honoring activism in our traditional beliefs about spiritual connection to the land and the driving force for us on this issue. The site that they are dealing with is the West Valley demonstration project.

When I was younger, I learned about the traditional world view of my people and in life today I find myself often steeped in this Cherokee stream of consciousness. It’s taking years to have a proper understanding of how this integrates into the world around me. I believe the sky, the ground below us, and this middle ground we walk on are all intertwined and connected. When the ground and waters below our feet are damaged, we damage ourselves. The past few years have been full of ups and downs, stalemates, wins, and losses. One thing that has remained consistent has been the learning from indigenous leadership and communities on the frontlines that are most impacted by the issues related to the nuclear industry. Much has been learning to integrate the traditional worldview with this work and organizing. It hasn’t just been a journey of learning, but a prayerful one as well.

The trip started out early Friday morning. The drive was five hours and we were going to meet at Niagara Falls. I traveled with my youngest child and we had an awesome drive along southern Lake Erie. Well except that we passed by three aged and degraded nuclear reactors along the way. A sign that nuclear issues on the Great Lakes, especially Lake Erie, are a real thing. The reactors I knew about but learning about West Valley was something new.

We arrived on time and met our folks and went and saw the falls and rapids that led up to it. I tried to capture the essence of its power with pictures and a video, but it didn’t do any justice.

After that, we went to the Seneca casino to eat at their buffet, which was by far the nicest and best buffet I’ve ever eaten at. I easily put away five plates.😅

The next day of prayer and water walk started out really early in the morning. I rode with Shannon to meet Maria and Joon Sung at the West Valley Project site. Joon Sung is a Japanese Buddhist elder who has been doing work around nuclear issues and prayer walking for decades with Indigenous Peoples on these continents. Her home country is Japan and it has two major events that shaped her work. These were devastating impacts of the nuclear bombs that were dropped on their country during World War II and the Fukushima Daiichi plant meltdown. She has been following and praying alongside folks since the 70s and knew Maria for decades. We connected pretty well and had lots to talk about since the Fermi Two reactor is the same flawed model of Mark-1 reactor design as the one at Fukushima that melted down.

The air at the site was familiar to me. Not like I had been there before, but more like I recognized the vibes and sometimes I’m not sure if it’s an energetic stain or the radiation I’m feeling when at these sites but it’s very familiar. I could tell something was going on here, I don’t know if it’s just an energy or if it’s in my mind, but when I go to these radioactive sites, I can totally feel like an energy. And I associate this energy with the feeling that I get whenever I’m near the Sequoyah Fuels site in Oklahoma that I grew up around that my community and Native Americans For a Clean Environment (NACE) worked on that is now a superfund site. The West Valley Citizens’ Task Force was formed to work towards accountability and clean-up of the site out of necessity. Similar to NACE, they learned about, monitored, and challenged things at the site.

It was a rainy, stormy morning, which kind of worked out because the site is known to be radioactive and the rain had stopped as soon as we arrived, which helped because it helped keep the dust and radiation down, kinda out of the air and so that felt good. Plus rain is cleansing, especially in times of gatherings or prayer. We did the sunrise ceremony there on the edge of the site, kind of near the woods. Shannon shared their people's traditional Thanksgiving prayer, perfectly fitting, it acknowledges all of life. Then we left for the Water/Prayer Walk, to be “Water Walkerz” as they said.

We arrived at Cattaraugus Creek, where a couple people had already arrived. Some there to walk and some there to send us on our way with songs and good words. They opened with good words from the elders who have been doing this and working on the issue for a long time. This was the prep and meaningful intention. I looked around and I saw that people had shown up from different parts of the state, these folks who knew about the issue and had been involved in some way or another, past or presently. The variety of Tribal members really showed that this is something that the whole tribe is concerned about because the Traditional and Governmental parts came together for it.

After the prayers and the good words and under the look of a potentially rainy sky, we set off on a 6.5 -mile journey. After that, we would drive the rest 7 more miles to meet back up with the Cattaraugus Creek where it drains into Lake Erie on the Eastern basin. Now, like I mentioned before, the Fermi 2 reactor that we work on is on the western basin. This is important to note because we have developed a prayerful and intentful relationship with the water here on the western Basin and to deliver our prayers to the other side of the water to combine them with folks who are doing a similar thing is a powerful thing. For me it was really important to do this as we have lots of prayers for Lake Erie, the water and land, and a nuclear-free future here in Michigan.

The youth were out in full force and leading the way. There was a prayer stick they carried almost all the way. At any given point in time there were anywhere from 10 to 20 people walking with a caravan of vehicles behind us with folks who were unable to walk or needed a break or just wanted to support for a little while since this was pretty much an all-day thing. The Caravan was also helpful because some folks could drive ahead to stopping points to pick up or switch out walkers who were ready to jump back in or needed a break.

Joon Sung drummed and sang Buddist chants strong and steady the whole time. It gave me life in the later miles when I was beginning to feel the walk lol. We had stops planned to honor the children and people with games, easter egg hunts, and food. That kept the spirits high too. There were people with baby strollers and even the president of the tribe walked with us for quite a few miles and he was also honored at one of our stops because of how he has got the tribe back involved in the cleanup for this site.

We reached our final walking destination and began to load up and figure out who was riding with who to get to the mouth of the river at Lake Erie. Before we loaded into one of the vehicles, Maria gave me something that was a gift from the president here in the tribe. It was a golden medal with their tribal insignia and symbolism on it.

She said it was for the prayers I shared and the walk I did with them, it was a thank you. I was thankful and it felt very meaningful. I felt very blessed to have been honored in such a way.

After we loaded up and drove to the final site where we would drop our tobacco and say our final words, we learned from one of the indigenous scientists, Shannon, about how the radionuclides and other toxins from the site are found in this area 15 miles away. She also talked about studies and monitoring to find this information.

At this moment, when I released my tobacco into the water, I also released my prayers that I had carried with me from here that I have for the waters on this side of Lake Erie and the Great Lakes. I knew my job had been done.

I also saw another activist who saw us walking down the road during the walk. I had met her at the Protecting Mother Earth Conference too. That was a cool thing that happened but not totally surprising though because stuff like that happens whenever you're visiting other people's reservations and territories. The night ended with some of the Walkers being invited to a social dance in the territory and I was more than excited to attend. After all, it's not just the land that we honor, it's also the people of the land that we honor.