Jessica Elaine Matz,
LaVergne, TN.
I look white and I was raised white, but when we were kids, we went to the occasional pow wow and were told “this is part of your heritage.” My uncle recently joined one of the Cherokee tribes, but I haven’t yet. I feel weird about it because there’s so much I don’t know about my own people. I will sometimes identify as Native American and remind myself that Chief John Baker looks as white as I do, but the knowledge gap keeps me from feeling like a “real” member of the tribe.
I’m the one on the left in the red headscarf in the picture. My eldest daughter is in front, my sister in the middle, and my mom on the right.
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