I grew up in Louisiana. I lived there for 14 years before moving to another part of Louisiana. After a few years of moving around, I lived in Las Vegas for 10 years. In those two places, I grew roots while I lived there. I felt like I was home. I shared with the others who lived there dealing with the same road consruction, I smelled the same wildfires, I knew the surrounding areas in a local kind of way… Like not the "Morehouse Parish is north of Ouachita Parish" kind of knowledge you’d get from a map, but the "Morehouse Parish is where Bastrop is, who sometimes plays my school’s team, and where I was swimming once when a coach asked me if I would be on their swim team and Ouachita Parish is where I live." THAT kind of knowledge. That’s roots and I feel it’s important to grow them emotionally, to feel like you’re home, that you have a home, even with all its defects. It’s also important if you want to be politically involved, to understand certain issues, other people who also live where you do. I would say it’s good for children to get this feeling too because it teaches them to make strong connections to not only other people, but the earth they live on, the seasons, the different bugs, animals, plants, trees and food associated with a particular area.
To have no sense of place is I think a certain kind of stress that’s hard to describe. I’m glad I grew up with a sense of place; I think it’s partly why I connect so strongly with the earth and I would hope to be able to pass this vague sense onto my children. Growing roots is a way of connecting, of inter-being, of refusing to be the islands this capitalist culture seems to demand that we be.