Time

"What do we need to remember that will push back against the forgetting encouraged by consumer culture and linear time? What can we remember that will surround us in oceans of history and potential? And how?" —Alexis Pauline Gumbs

By some measurements, the retention rate of the Great Lakes (how long it takes one drop of water to pass all the way through all five lakes) is 250 years. 250 is how long the United States Declaration of Independence will have been ratified in 2026.

1776 was a watershed year. Alongside the fighting of the American Revolution, this portentous year saw the invasion of the Cherokee Nation and destruction of 36 Cherokee towns, the founding of the Mission San Francisco de Asis in now-San Francisco, the first European exploration of the region between the Rockies and the Sierras, and the first commercial sales of the Watt steam engine. 1776 also saw the publishing of the first volume of Edward Gibbons’ The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, as well as Adam Smith’s The Wealth of Nations. And the founding of the Illuminati in Bavaria to boot.

Fun fact: According to Wikipedia, in 1776 there were at least 31 different calendars measuring that year based on different perceptions of the beginning of time.

So, how do we measure time? And what kinds of measurements are needed most right now?

Remarkably, 2026—the year the United States turns 250—will also be the quincentennial (the 500 year anniversary) of the first European ship to make contact with the North America west coast. 1526: the Spanish ship Santiago reaches the Pacific Coast of Mexico, peace is declared between France and the Holy Roman Empire, the deadline for Spanish muslims to convert to Christianity is reached, the first complete printed translation of the New Testament into English arrives in England, the Beretta Gun Company—one of the world’s oldest firearm corporations, still in business—is founded, and Spanish conquistadors reach Inca territory in South America.

What memories held in the water of this land from 250 years ago are readying to leave the bioregion? What stories—that have held water for generations—are making way for something else?

In 1996, many around the world celebrated the quincentennial of Columbus’s near-total genocide of the Taíno. Many also protested this commemoration, and during that year diasporic Taíno began recovering traces of their culture, identity, and worldviews, calling upon embodied memories of traditions and values disseminated across generations. Many were propelled to become citizen scientists, comparing familial and local customs with Taíno beliefs and rituals recorded in the conquest chronicles. Christina M. González says, “While elaborate Taíno ceremonies and belief systems did not survive the conquest era intact, Native retentions are evident in some of the syncretic, or blended, religions of the rural Caribbean, reflecting a complex fusion of folk Catholic, Afro-diasporic and Native traditions.”

One of the many ways Taíno survived is through words like hurakan (hurricane). “From an ancient Taíno perspective, the hurakan was an expression of the fury of Guabancex, mistress of violent churnings of wind and rain, and one of the manifestations of Atabey (the consciousness of Mother Earth).”

Perhaps the retention rate of the Christopher Columbus imaginary is 500 years… 1992 is when Berkeley officially recognized the first Indigenous Peoples Day, and 29 years later, it became national news.

More hurricanes are coming, and to prepare ourselves, we might try to measure the cycles of transformation we’re in. We might retrace our steps, return to what was originally here: before contact and colonization, before the steam engine and firearms, before mandated conversion to Christianity, before mass distribution of the bible and English tongue, before the decline and fall of empire rising into independence, before capitalism and the wealth of nations.
Local Ojibwe elders have the word waankam meaning “pristine” or “the way it was originally.” How can we call upon embodied memories to reverse time and let new stories take hold?