The story of “Ashes on the Water,” written by Quelemia Sparrow, is emotionally intense and requires that the listener maintain an intellectual connection with the media while they walk through the city. This isn’t hard, as the richness of sound and detail as well as strong vocal performances by indigenous artists (famed Cree-Saulteaux actor Margo Kane contributed her voice to the project as well as Elizabeth McLaughlin and Quelemia Sparrow) illustrate a complete and moving auditory narrative.

“So we beat on…. borne ceaselessly back into the past” -F. Scott Fitzgerald

“Ashes on the Water” is an immersive experience that transports the listener through time. For me, what struck was that I did not feel like I was losing my sense of placement in “contemporary” time at all. As I listened to the podplay I felt even more aware of my surroundings and the histories that still live and breathe on the land today.

Unknown Photographer, Crab Park

For me, the podplay served to delineralize time. I felt I was witnessing the experiences of the past and present simultaneously. While listening I was moving through the city, crossing the street and passing other people. This things did not slip away but instead complemented the story I was listening to. I felt that the events in the story I was hearing and the events happening around me were connected by place. I felt I was equally in two places at once, jumping at the sound of a crash on the podplay while side-stepping a man walking his bike along the sidewalk. It felt like a subversion of this strong disconnect we often feel towards the past. In dominant cultural narratives, stories about the past are presented as being events that happened once but are no longer happening. “Ashes on the Water” felt like a reminder that this way of thinking is not really true. While listening, I felt strongly emotionally engaged with what I was hearing. I was able to imagine the things I was hearing and see them in front of me, but I did not feel that I had somehow travelled into the past. Instead it felt like the past had travelled to me and that the voices I was hearing were with me in the present as much as I was imagining myself with them in the past.

“Time isn’t precious at all, because it is an illusion.” -Eckhart Tolle

The podplay ends with the listener gazing at the water from Crab Park. The same shores where the story took (or is taking) place. The listener watches the waves and listens to their rhythms, unsure if what they are hearing is part of the story or the sound of the real waves in front of them.