Diane Larsback is a proud First Nations artist, poet and storyteller, of Cree and Iroquois heritage. In Raven’s Heart, her book of poetry available for sale HERE and in the Kelowna Heritage Museum gift shop, Diane weaves memoir and poetry to chronicle her powerful life-journey into healing and wholeness.

Diane shared her wisdom with us over lunch near the apartment she recently moved into. She described what certain places in the city mean to her and warns against making judgments without understanding.

That’s the bridge where I spent Christmas eve six and a half years ago. This is the side view where I’m standing on the bridge, and it was very cold and I didn’t have a jacket. All I had was a sweater and a pair of pants. I was all huddled under there all night, trying to detox on my own, waiting for morning so I could go to the hospital. I made it to the hospital the next morning at sun up and they kicked me out, so I ended up having to get drunk again to avoid the shakes, and just carrying on. I was still drunk [the evening before] so I knew I had to sleep it off as best I could, and then hopefully they would admit me.

Under there too, that night, I remember my liver was at that point where it was very very serious, because you get a big lump just under your ribs and it hurts to touch that side. So I remember I fell asleep at one point, but it’s not really falling asleep because it’s all ugly, but I got poked by something. It was like somebody poked me and woke me up. I remember getting poked and I remember thinking “Oh thank you, whoever that was” because I knew if I had fallen asleep I wouldn’t have woken up. So I know it was probably my family trying to help me not to die. Lots of odd things like that happen. They would probably scare a lot of people, but I know the spirits are there.

The big tree. That’s the one right on Richter and Wardlaw, right across from the dog park. They left that tree, thank gosh. That’s why I wanted to take that picture – to honour it. Because people just take trees down and they don’t know how long that tree has been there, how many people it’s sheltered, how much air it’s cleansed over the years, and they make a decision in a meeting within an hour or two to tear down a tree that’s been there for a century. How egotistical we humans are to do such a thing. A lot of times in the summer, people take refuge under that tree, or in the tree. They climb up so nobody will bug them. And a lot of people have went up in there in the bushes, because cops can’t see you when it’s in full bloom.

Just to rest. To stop for a moment, rest your feet, your street feet.

You can never rest. It’s judgment –
Oh, you look like a bum, so I’m going
to ask you to move along, or you look
like a member of society, so you have
a right to sit there. I don’t understand
that. You’re sitting, you can sit.
Everybody’s part of the city. 

Everybody gets street feet at some point. When you go back to [Alexander Gardner] the best part is when you can take off your shoes and socks and soak them and then put on fresh socks, and usually the staff there have knowledge of what happens to your feet. So they have all of the little salves and band-aids and stuff. But a fresh pair of socks is the ultimate. But how many years has that tree been alive, from a sprout to that, what it has seen. And then the other ones, they had other ones there, but they just got ripped apart. Tore down. They decided that tree was the lucky tree.

This is my home. My home after many many years. I think the last home I really had was when Raven left, when my son left twelve years ago. So this is my first home in twelve years on my own. So when I’m riding my bike there or whatever, I just think, I have a place! It’s awesome, I have a place to go and nobody’s going to do room checks and nobody’s going to be disrespecting my space. Because in recovery homes, there’s no sense of trust, because you’re a junkie, how can we trust you, anything you say, so people do room checks, even though they do urine tests, there’s still no trust. So it’s very sad.

And how long have you been there for?

Four months. Now I have a keyboard, because I’m learning how to play the piano. That’s always what I’ve wanted to do, is learn. Toby’s helping me, so I go up to her house and she gives me a new lesson and then I come home and practice.

And that was One Cup, on St. Paul. And that was the first kind of straight job endeavour that I tried to do after Raven left as well. And they really helped. They help no matter what your work history is like, they’re actually geared towards helping people who have gaps or they have varying disabilities, or they have no sense of pride anymore. So they do classes for the first month and then they train you to be a barista. And it’s not like you have to be a barista, but it’s just to get some sense of satisfaction, right, that you can do something.

So that’s where it all begins.I ended up starting the store just because of my experience with One Cup. I would tell anybody, go there. Go to that program if you want a first step towards getting work or school or just to know who you are and what you can accomplish. 

And this fella, I call him the Happy Bear when I think of him.

I seen them the day before, and they’re newbies downtown. I think they’re just travelling, him and his girlfriend. So I’d seen them the day before in the back alley where my little shop is, and they were very, very drunk, but he said “Oh, I like your earrings.” So I said yeah I got this little place here, when you guys are sober come in and check it out. And he goes, “You know what, I know how to make those. I was in jail and I know how to make them.” And I believe it, because most brothers who know how to bead, they learn it while they’re inside. So if you meet anybody who knows how to bead, they’ve most likely learned it while they’ve got some quiet time in jail.

 So who teaches them?

Usually there’s an elder, in the female side they call it the Eagle Hut, and that’s for First Nations women, and they always have one in every jail for First Nations people to pray or to learn or to do anything, so they show you everything you need to know and they usually have an elder that comes every day. So a lot of the guys learn how to do carving, they learn how to bead, and that’s where they start. 

So he was just laying there the next day, and I asked if I could take his picture, and his girlfriend was sitting with my other little buddy, so that’s why she’s in the other picture. But he was just laying in the sun and happy and already starting a new drunken day. But he was happy, so that made me happy. He was very at peace, he was very happy. 

That’s what I remember sometimes about being in that world, I miss the freedom from responsibility.

The freedom to not do anything, to just be.
You don’t have to go anywhere, you don’t
have an appointment, you don’t have to
pay anybody, you don’t have to do all these
things that I do now. You can just be happy,
you can be mad, you can be angry,
you can be… there’s no expectation.

Nobody has any expectations of you. It’s a very different life. When I see this again I remember that feeling.

That’s where everybody meets, the tower. “The Clocks,” they call it, “I’ll meet you at the Clocks.” Everybody knows the Clocks. And that’s where you go if you’re getting out of the drunk tank, you go there and you can usually find someone that’s drinking and then you help each other get rid of the shakes. So when you sober up, there’s nobody to help you sober up, but if you want to drink, there’s always somebody to help you get drunk.

If you’re hardcore, when you get to that point
where you do get the shakes, by then you’re
only drinking to feel normal. You don’t get
drunk anymore, you can just function.

So you don’t get drunk anymore, it’s way past the point where it’s a party. And you know you’re in trouble then.

And that’s Candace. This woman is, to me, halfway to being a genius. She can do anything on the computer. Right now she is dealing with getting her five children back. And this woman is sober, she has a home, but because of I don’t know what, just maybe because she’s Native, maybe because they say it’s her history, her traumatic history, all these things where they think she can’t mother her children, but she still remains sober. She still remains sober even though she cries, because she misses them.

I have nothing but respect for her. That’s a strong, strong girl there. I just think she’s a miracle. I’m really glad Creator put us together. Because I think she has to do with the vision I was given. She’s one of the people that’s going to help. I call her my spirit sister. Real quiet nature, too. She is very gentle, very quiet, low, quiet voice. But she did my taxes and everything, she did all these computer things for me that I didn’t know how to do. 

And this is Noel. He’s the janitor at the Friendship Center. But he also, in the opening ceremonies, holds the eagle staff when all the participants first come in. He’s had a very similar life to mine, I won’t go into detail, but incredibly similar upbringing, and then you know, now to be walking the red road, it’s a miracle. So we’re pretty good friends now. He’s a nice, quiet guy, and once you get to know him, he’s funny. So he was really down with that idea of superimposing regalia, not a before and after, but maybe a now and then kind of picture.

Everybody has judgments, and it’s like,
unless you’ve walked beside everybody
from the time they were born until now,
then you can make a judgment. But until
then, nobody can. We’re human beings,
we all have wishes and hopes and what
we want to be. Nobody said, “I want to be
found in a dumpster drunk” or go in
and out of hospitals to get sober, or
have to drink to get sober. 

I’ve always wanted to take photos, because my beauty is different from other people’s. We all see differently. Sometimes I wish that I had learned how to take photos. Maybe I still will. Darkrooms and all that stuff, I like that. Cause I think my eye is good.