The first thing this made me think of is an activity that some wellness classes in my high school had to participate in. The activity entailed wearing a bracelet for a week and every time you caught yourself complaining, you had to switch the wrist that the bracelet was on. The goal was to realize how much you were complaining and to minimize it. Looking back, this makes me feel weird! Is that a form of censorship? Were they trying to make us more compliant? Well, I never had to do the activity so I am still very good at complaining. Honestly, picking one single thing to complain about and really following through with that complaint is a big undertaking... especially the part where I pick just one. This past summer I developed a really big complaint relating to my local area of Plymouth and nearby towns. It was such a big complaint that I was inclined to email some people at the town hall to ask what to do about it. I got some helpful responses but it turned into a much bigger commitment than I was willing to take on at the time. Of course, I lost momentum and dropped the case. My complaint is: Why is Asquamchumauke (The Baker River) still named “The Baker River”? It is named after the man who lead his scouts to massacre the indigenous community that was thriving in this valley, their village where the old armory and PSU parking lots are. All that’s left at the site is a rock with a memorial plaque on it. Of course in my head I say, well duh - step one is change the name of the river back to its original. Then reality emails me back to tell me that changing the name of a
geographic feature on many printed and official maps is a huge process. It was recommended that I start with creating some things (like bumper stickers and pins) to sell to raise awareness and money to have new signs put up at river crossings. What else could we do to honor the people who’s land we are on? One idea I had is to possibly create a mural and/or other nature art that would live at the old village site. I could reach out to the people who erected the plaque, the Asquamchumauke Chapter Daughters of the American Revolution, to see if they would even be interested in this collaboration or if there is anything else they could use support for. I feel, at the very least, people who live here or go to school at PSU and park their cars on the old site should know who lived here and what happened to them.
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