Issue link: http://maconmagazine.uberflip.com/i/1534028
70 maconmagazine.com | April/May 2025 we'd have 10 people in the house. You just slept where you could fit in. And the best part was always breakfast! If I got up early enough, I could go to the garage sales with her and maybe we would get to get a donut or go to McDonald's. She was also an assistant nurse and worked in the hospital, for 25 years in pediatrics. Despite raising many kids, she was a very hardworking woman. She started to have impacts of diabetes and had a heart attack, had open heart surgery, and she retired. She's Raccoon Clan. Every time I see a raccoon, I think about her. I get my clan from her, too. She's somebody who impacted my life at a very young age and made sure that I knew who my family was. Of course, I love my mother and my father too, and I'll honor them always, but I would say my grandmother was the most important woman. Thank you for honoring her and bringing her story to life. What was her name? Juanita Ruth Kelly. Her original last name was Beaver. In that same vein, is there a particular challenge you see young women facing today and do you have any advice for them, someone who might want to follow your path? I think that it can be very challenging for women in any leadership role to want to be career driven. I think sometimes the greatest challenge would be the fear of not knowing – being willing to branch out and leave home, especially in my community. There's a lot of opportunities outside of the state that you live in, but sometimes it's too hard or complicated to take that opportunity because you may be leaving back family that needs your help, or it's too hard to be alone. I think that my advice is to not be afraid of the unknown and to take a risk and to blaze your own path. If you can envision it, you should try to go Mark your calendars for the 2025 Ocmulgee Indigenous Celebration on September 13-14 in Macon, or take the opportunity to travel to Oklahoma for the Muscogee Nation Festival June 26-29. after that. I also feel that there's pressure on women to start a family early and that it can be a challenge to try to balance your education and career and really livelihood with having children and starting a family. I remember one time in graduate school, they were saying that higher education for women was like birth control. The higher educated you were, the less children you would have. At the time, I didn't like that. That's not why I went to school. I fully understand [now] why people would say that is something that's an outcome. But I would just say, you've got to do what you want to do and what you like. Finding that can take time, but when opportunities arise that you should take them regardless of if someone in your family, or someone in your life, has done it or not. The idea of blazing your own trail is fantastic advice. Is there anything else you'd want to share? We are really looking forward to having 64th National Park, the first National Park in Georgia, to be the Ocmulgee Mounds National Park and Preserve. We're dedicated and motivated to continue to see that designation being recognized, and hope that we can see that come to life in the future. I am very excited to see all these great opportunities that have been going on in Macon. It's really indigenizing the town and community, and it's showing a lot of respect and honor. I think that there really is strong leadership in Middle Georgia that is now being spread to Atlanta and into Columbus. There's now more and more communities who are saying, "We want to welcome you home, too." That is an awesome feeling. We invite you to the Muscogee Creek Nation Festival. It's usually the third week in June, and there's so much to see and experience and learn. We welcome you to come and visit us. We'd be happy to show you around. Always feel free to reach out if you'd like to learn more about who we are, and our people. ABOVE Butler has worked with a number of groups to steward preservation of land and cultural resources. "To see the commitment and hard work of everybody, to see Muscogee artists featured in Macon and to see our Muscogee language on the streets – those are all victories."