I watched a show tonight on Facebook about the Orca Killer Whales of the West Coast. I learned that the pods are led by grandmother's and knowledge is passed from the grandmothers and mothers to the pods. I also learned that different pods have different languages. Or different dialects. Each pod can tell that the other pods are speaking but they cannot understand the language.
This is so like what I have learned about trees. Trees have networks that communicate through their roots. And it is the grandmother trees that pass their knowledge down from generation to generation.
This seems to be true of indigenous people everywhere, as far as I can tell from my readings. It seems to me a particular curse of white supremacy that the nuclear family is apparently worshiped, and age is not seen as a crowning achievement but as an affront to youth.
More on these things as they develop in my mind.
