by Thomas King

J GRAPH KING, T.

Laetitia wants to see what is outside of Canada. Her mom is not happy, but her mom and her brother drive her to the border anyway. Mom and brother decide that they want to see Laetitia, but the Canadian border wants them to declare their citizenship. They are Blackfoot, and they do not identify themselves as Canadian or American. Both the Canadian border and the American border want them to declare citizenship of a country, but mom refuses to so they are stuck sleeping in their car between borders until television crews arrive and the American border lets them in. I did not realize this was a struggle that Indigenous people experience, and I felt empathy for everyone.