Returning Home

 

This massive blanket, entitled “Returning Home,” was commissioned by the Suquamish Clearwater Resort which opened the weekend of May 27, 2006.

This 7’ x 12’ fiber weaving is hung by a cedar blanket board with two carved salmon.

We invite you to visit the stunning display of Salish art that includes, not only this weaving, but larger than life welcome figures, colossal house posts, an eye-catching cedar mat and much more. Definitely check it out!

This Salish blanket carries the name, Returning Home. The design in the blanket board and blanket represents the Salmon People returning home each year to find their place of birth. My elders taught me that the Creator gave the gift of celestial navigation to Salmon People and instructed them to teach humans to always remember to return to their ancestral homeland. The Salmon People have the ability to never get lost and to always find their way back. It is an eternal cycle that they constantly carry out to honor the Creator and a teaching they will convey to humans until the end of time as long as humans continue to honor their presence in ceremony.

The middle element of the blanket board represents the Stars Above the Suquamish Territory. The Salmon people will leave their place of birth just as the sons and daughters of Suquamish may leave the reservation to pursue an education, a job or simply to explore life. The Salmon People return to their birth waters by first using the stars to navigate to their general territorial water and then they are directed by their sense of smell that stimulates powerful memories.

Amazingly, they return to their birth place to start the cycle of creation all over again by spawning in the very water in which they were born. This is represented in the twined design along each end of the blanket. The orange layers are the different orange coloration of salmon eggs, the gray color is the gravel that covers the eggs and the blue element is the water that flows under, through and around the eggs. Where ever Suquamish tribal members have gone when leaving the reservation, hopefully they will always feel the need to return home. That is the very reason there has been such a concerted effort to weave together all the enterprises like the casino and resort, so as to create the kind of wealth that will support education and jobs for tribal members so they can choose to live in their ancestral homeland.