I have a bit more to say about #firstcontact, so bear with me:

I was walking with my mother the other day, from the coffee shop by my work and back to my office, and we were talking about the memoir I'm working on and how it ties into reconciliation. /1 And she said, "You know David, I hate how Indigenous Peoples have to validate their own existence." My dad has said something similar, too. That reconciliation, to him, is having a conversation, and in that dialogue, seeing past the stereotype. /2