Ahtahkakoop Cree Nation's first Pride Week celebrates roles once sacred in Indigenous communities

Prairie Pride is a series by Local Journalism Initiative reporter Julia Peterson that celebrates queer life in rural Saskatchewan. 

Elders, students and school staff drummed and sang an honour song as two flags were raised above Ahtahkakoop Cree Nation on Monday morning: the First Nation's flag and, for the first time ever, the two-spirit Pride flag.

For Ahtahkakoop Pride committee member Sheldon Gaetz, who lives on the First Nation with his husband, watching the flags go up in tandem was a moving experience.

"We started off with a pipe ceremony, and then we did the flag raising at the school, which was beautiful," said Gaetz. "It was really nice, having that spirituality with First Nations culture and the LGBTQ2S+ movement together.

"I know there were community members who were so proud to see the flag raised."

The flag-raising was the start of Ahtahkakoop's first-ever Pride Week and was followed by a colourful Spirit Day. Later in the week, the Pride committee broadcast educational messages on the radio and social media, organized a Drag Queen Bingo night and made stacks of posters.

Gaetz says the enthusiasm for all these events has been heartening to see.

"You see Pride all over the place, and so it's nice to have it here, in the community," he said.

Fellow Pride committee member Alex Powalinsky says there has already been an "amazing" response.

"For the people that we've spoken to, and the people who have been celebrating, they say it's giving them the space to breathe for the first time and say 'wait, it might be OK for me to just be who I am,'" said Powalinsky.

"There are a lot of people who everyone knows are under the LGBTQ2S+ umbrella — but it's kind of a thing where that's not really spoken about or acknowledged. They're just there, they exist, and we continue to go on with the status quo.

"This is an opportunity for them to see that people do see them and acknowledge them, so it's just been really healing."

At a poster-making session on Wednesday afternoon, the conference room at the health centre was full of smiles, laughter and determined purpose — and lots of glitter — as people made signs to carry in the Pride parade on Friday afternoon.

Around the table, Danielle Meiklejohn was adding pompoms to her celebratory poster reading "love being a Fruit Loop in a world full of Cheerios."