My gram had a way of answering questions without answering them at all.
We all knew it.
But I don’t think I understood it… until the day of her funeral.
Years before she passed, I had interviewed her on a VHS tape.
It was when I first learned she was a boarding school survivor, and I wanted to capture her story—her voice—before it was gone.
So I sat with her, camera rolling, asking questions.
Trying to understand.
At one point on the tape, I asked her:
“Do you mind if I smoke?”
She didn’t answer.
So I lit a cigarette.
Fast forward to her funeral.
We were all gathered, watching that same tape together.
And as that moment played—there I was, younger me, sitting in her house, smoking—
my cousins immediately said:
“You know she didn’t like smoking in her house.”
They were laughing… but they were right.
And that’s when it hit me.
She never told me no.
Not then. Not ever.
Not because she didn’t have preferences.
Not because she didn’t have feelings.
But because somewhere along the way…
she had learned not to say them out loud.
I’ve thought about that moment so many times since.
Was it because she was a woman, in a time when women were expected to be agreeable?
Was it because she was Native, and learned that speaking up didn’t always feel safe?
Or was it something even deeper…
something shaped in places like boarding schools,
where voice was taken,
identity was controlled,
and silence became a form of survival?
I don’t have one answer.
But I know this:
Silence doesn’t just happen.
It’s learned.
It’s reinforced.
It’s inherited.
At one point in my life, I was told something that stayed with me.
That I was meant to speak for those who couldn’t.
And at the time… I didn’t fully understand what that meant.
Was it women?
Was it Native people?
Was it both?
Now I think I understand it differently.
It’s not about speaking for anyone.
It’s about giving voice to what was never allowed to be said.
My gram didn’t say no.
But that doesn’t mean she didn’t feel it.
And somewhere between her silence…
and my voice…
there is a responsibility.
To listen more closely.
To understand more deeply.
To say the things that didn’t have space before.
I come from a woman who survived by staying quiet.
And I honor that.
But I also carry something else now.
Not just her silence…
but the choice to speak.