As Mayor Lyn Hall spoke about the future, the future was ignoring every word, cheerfully drowning him out with their squeals of excitement.
While more than 200 people gathered in Lheidli T'enneh Memorial Park for the official opening of the pavilion Thursday morning, some of the kids could have cared less. On one side, they were running through the spray in the children's water park and on the other side, another group were having fun on the slides and the swings in the playground. Together, their voices were loud and strong with joy, unencumbered by the past and the solemn proceedings a short distance away.
Such is the innocence of childhood, when the past is the mac and cheese with baby carrots on the side they had for supper last night and the future is their playschool friend's birthday party tomorrow afternoon.
Those young people were the future Hall was speaking about.
But so were the Lheidli T'enneh young people, from the Kelly Road teenager who played her guitar and sung Vance Joy's Riptide to the younger ones who helped Hall, Chief Dominic Frederick and other dignitaries uncover the pillars recognizing both them and their elders, connecting youth and wisdom, past and future, into a present, together.
Of course, it's not perfect.
Children transition to adulthood only after they're able feel the pain of the past and fear the uncertainty of the future.
As Frederick noted in his remarks to the gathered crowd, the pavilion's construction reopened old wounds, with the discovery of the remains of 12 Lheidli people on the site. Properly honouring their ancestors and accommodating the strong feelings of elders who remember how parts of their cemetery were bulldozed over in the fall of 1957 to increase the size of the park brought the Lheidli together. The remains are now in two sites together with their people again in the nearby burial ground.
Yet still there are those who refuse to see.
They refuse to show respect for the region's original inhabitants.
They refuse to recognize their beloved Fort George Park is, most importantly, a cemetery.
They refuse to accept their part in the racist oppression of Indigenous peoples.
They refuse to shoulder their responsibility in building an inclusive present and future for everyone.
On Thursday, Frederick had words for them, too, but instead of anger, he gave them fact soaked in humour.
His wife had shown him some of the Facebook comments from local residents reacting to the dedication of the pavilion and National Indigenous Peoples Day, stubbornly saying they will always call it Fort George Park.
The chief finds that pretty funny because before the Lheidli T'enneh were allowed to name themselves in their own language, a federal government bureaucrat christened them as the Fort George Band. In other words, the park's name has always recognized the original people who first settled there.
The drumming and the singing and the dancing were beautiful to see and hear, as all celebrations of culture are for those who choose to watch and listen.
So were the sight and sounds of the children playing nearby.
The park and the pavilion, along with the playground, the water park and the nearby museum invite everyone to come together, just as the Nechako and the Fraser do. This public place is an open condemnation to those who refuse to grow up, who still want to be served their mac and cheese version of history and who think they diminish their identity and betray their heritage by acknowledging the traditional territory of the Lheidli people.
At the centre of the pavilion is a table, always a place where people come together to talk, to share a meal, mend grievances, find common ground and form alliances.
The pavilion stands tall overhead, welcoming all who come to the park to seek shelter beneath it, to come to the table, to listen to the children playing nearby, to pay respects to those who came before and lie in peace on these sacred grounds.
