Clayton Thomas-Müller reflects on the spirituality, healing and hope in Life in the City of Dirty Water
Life in the City of Dirty Water was championed by forest ecologist Suzanne Simard on Canada Reads 2022
Clayton Thomas-Müller is a member of the Treaty #6 based Mathias Colomb Cree Nation located in Northern Manitoba. He's campaigned on behalf of Indigenous peoples around the world for more than 20 years, working with numerous organizations for social and environmental justice. Life in the City of Dirty Water is his first book.
Life in the City of Dirty Water covers Thomas-Müller's entire life: from playing with toy planes as a way to escape from domestic and sexual abuse and enduring intergenerational trauma to becoming a committed environmental activist. Along the way, Clayton remained tied to his Cree heritage and spirituality and the memoir is a vision of healing and responsibility.
Suzanne Simard championed Life in the City of Dirty Water on Canada Reads 2022.
Thomas-Müller spoke with CBC Books about the inspiration for Life in the City of Dirty Water, healing from trauma and fighting for to protect the environment.
Where did you find the inspiration for Life in the City of Dirty Water?
When my sons were around four and six years old, I found myself having a super hard time doing day-to-day tasks, like play time and homework and I kept like blanking out and going into autopilot. I've been going to therapy my whole life and I talked to my therapist about wanting to be present for my family. He said that disassociative behaviour is really normal for people who went to Indian residential school or the children of people who went to residential school.
I asked, 'How do I deal with this? What do I do?' And he said to keep on going to therapy and ceremonies in a sweat lodge, pray about it — and write about it.
It was in the decolonial spirit to do it in a different way.
I was thinking about storytelling and specifically about how we do it in our culture. We don't have this written language — it's all oration. So I thought to myself, "Well, why don't I just record a bunch of stories where I can talk and feel natural and comfortable?" So the book was very much done in a Native way — in the spirit of cooperation, non-written language. It was in the decolonial spirit to do it in a different way.
How does it feel having you first book on Canada Reads?
I prayed that this book would be on Canada Reads because I wanted to touch as many people in Canada and around the world as possible so that they could talk about these difficult topics and that it would become normal for them to move forward together.
A lot of ceremony, power prayer went into this book — even that beautiful painting on the front cover. And Creator always answered my prayers. That's why I'm always so adamant to the young people I meet when I tell them, "Be careful that you pray for because you will get it."
Often when our lives are getting torn apart, we fail to recognize that that's our ancestors and Creator giving us the conditions required so the things we prayed for can actually happen.
A lot of ceremony, power prayer went into this book.
What was it like revisiting some of the painful memories in the book?
If I'm being really honest, writing this book opened up a lot of old wounds. And my family had already paid such a high price for the career choices that I've made, with the time I've spent away from home. I think, for me, the greatest gift of the pandemic was the slowing down of the world and me not being able to travel.
But through it I managed to build up a very powerful, very good network of family and friends that kept me safe, kept my head above water and I was able to make it through and start doing healthier things.
Writing the book really took a lot out of me, but I'm really excited about what this book might do for the national discourse and the Canadian worldview and the conversations that I need to have with the country through this platform.
Life in the City of Dirty Water opens with a letter from your mother. Can you talk about the relationship you two have?
At the end of the day, this book was really about the mother. She was the one that was there my whole life. She went through a lot, from being a child and raising her siblings and having a child and trying to get finish high school and university and work full time. If anything, my mom taught me tough toughness. I just can't believe how tough she is. She taught me about not giving up, no matter how rough, just showing up and sticking it through.
She taught me that there's always consequences for your actions. If your actions are noble and brave and selfless then there's great blessings. And so she taught me about the true cost and the cheap price of life and happiness — and it really costs. We don't get that kind of truth very much in the western world.
If your actions are noble and brave and selfless then there's great blessings.
She was very, very adamant about spirituality and connection to Creator and connection to the Earth and about my morals and about doing the right thing and not and always telling the truth and not lying. I've lied a lot in my life, but I always come back to the truth. That's my mother's voice in my head.
Why is it so important for you to speak to Indigenous youth specifically?
I ended up finding my way into a social program to get my GED. So we would study in the morning and then do cultural programming in the afternoon. For the first time in my life, I got exposed to people who spoke their language freely, proudly — people who were sober and people that were going to ceremony on the regular. It kind of lit a spark inside of me. I just wanted other young people that were in my circumstance to have the same opportunity.
I speak to the youth because it's prophecy, straight up prophecy. I remember being young and thinking like, "Oh yeah, man, I'm in the seventh generation. We were born to change the world. We're going to end colonization and internalized oppression." As I got older and I became a father, I realized that my generation was just one part in it — but that's the work. I have great optimism in this current generation.
I have great optimism in this current generation.
My kids are part of that generation and these kids are doing intersectional analysis, these kids have critical race theory. These kids are redefining, crushing and destroying toxic patriarchal ideas — and rebuilding the sacred feminine energy that lives in all of these kids. Millions and millions of these children marched for climate justice. There's something really profound that's happening right now.
Why are you so committed to fighting for the health of the planet?
I'm not an environmentalist — I'm a human rights activist. This world is sacred, the water is sacred and our food is sacred. Whatever we do to the land and the water is going to happen to us. We're a part of it. If you look at a map of all Canada's First Nations and look at Canada's most toxic industries and toxic waste repositories — every one of these facilities is adjacent to Native communities.
So in this country, when you consider neo-colonialism and ongoing systemic oppression and who's privy to environmental enforcement and protection and law, it's not Native people. Canada's entire economic framework is dependent on the ongoing dispossession of Native people from their land.
If you look at a map of all Canada's First Nations and look at Canada's most toxic industries and toxic waste repositories — every one of these facilities is adjacent to Native communities.
We're not above the environment, dominating and owning it — chopping it up and extracting and selling it to the highest bidder. No, we are part of it. We come from it and we're going to return back to it.
How did becoming a father change the way you see the world?
I just can't describe how much I love my sons' mother. Living with her as she was pregnant with Felix and Jackson, both pregnancies, not going to lie, there was a lot of drama going on in our lives. My work was very hectic and I was gone a lot of the time, but it was so sacred.
When she gave birth to my son, Felix, it was very special to me because my mother didn't breastfeed. In the 1970s they would tell Native women that the formula was better than their breast milk. So my mother never breastfed me when I was a kid and I had horrible allergic reactions to the baby formula.
They made the work even more sacred, and they made my commitment to it stronger.
One of the things I would always say was that when I have a kid, as I see that kid latch on to their mom then I could die right there or face Creator or feel totally like I achieved everything. And so I remember when Felix was born and first time he latched on and just it was exhilarating. My sons just put my life in context. They made the work even more sacred, and they made my commitment to it stronger.
Clayton Thomas-Müller's comments have been edited for length and clarity.
The Canada Reads 2022 contenders
- Christian Allaire champions Five Little Indians by Michelle Good
- Malia Baker champions Scarborough by Catherine Hernandez
- Tareq Hadhad champions What Strange Paradise by Omar El Akkad
- Suzanne Simard champions Life In the City of Dirty Water by Clayton Thomas-Müller
- Mark Tewksbury champions Washington Black by Esi Edugyan
