However, you won’t see me claim I’m African-American
Or a Black person… though I’d be thrilled and honored to make these claims. My Senegal, Ivory Coast/Ghana and Nigeria DNA together beat Elizabeth Warren’s Native-American DNA 3 times over, but I don’t know my African ancestor(s). I haven’t lived a life with any of their experiences. I can’t own this.
It is cool though!
I estimate within 4-6 generations ago that I had direct lineal African ancestors and I hope someday I discover the confirmed genealogy of some individuals.
My curiosity runs wild and that would be a super exciting day, but I still won’t be able to own it.
DNA does not equal culture or identity
An ally is the most I’ll ever be. Which is still a great thing to be.
DNA is cool, but as they say – strictly for entertainment
First of all, it is extremely important to state that DNA does NOT make you Native. Or any other culture for that matter.
To be Native
To be Native, you must at minimum, have lineal descent from a Native Nation citizen. This means you must know your Native Nation. If you do not know your Native Nation and citizen relative, you cannot claim you are Native, Native-American, Indigenous, First Nations, etc. on the basis of DNA results or even worse family lore. You must know exactly who your relatives are. I feel ya, sometimes this means some difficult, time and money consuming research, but this is not optional.
Individual Native Nations may also have other citizenship requirements that I won’t discuss in this post. No matter what, DNA or family lore is not enough to claim Native heritage. There must be a clear and unbroken record of birth certificates (and adoption records if applicable) to the last Native Nation citizen in your lineage.
Clans and family membership are usually matrilineal or passed from mother to child. There are exceptions to this but that is usually how it rolls. Citizenship though is usually derived from either parent, but Native Nations have a wide variety of requirements, so do your research.
In my opinion the terminology would be as the following example. I am a Mvskoke citizen, so I would generally say I am a Mvskoke citizen or Mvskoke. A relative of mine with lineal descent that is not a citizen, would generally say they are a Mvskoke descendant or of Mvskoke descent. In my opinion, either of us could say we are Native or Indigenous. All this of course applies to North America.
DNA is great for finding relatives, or factually determining who your biological parents are though. It does not make someone Native.
My Native heritage is mixed obviously
Keep telling yourself, there is no such thing as a part-Native person. The only valid percentages for either are 0% or 100%. People are not fractional, they are whole. Racial/ethnic percentages also known as blood quantum are not real. Blood quantum is a white invention meant to bolster white supremacy.
Like blood quantum, DNA should not be used to attack Native heritage and bolster white supremacy.
In January 2023, I purchased a 14″ MacBook Pro M2 Pro with 12 core CPU, 19 core GPU, 16GB of memory and 1TB storage. At that time, I decided then that for my portability needs, it didn’t make sense to bump the memory or processor/GPU cores up. As a secondary system, I found the M2 Pro with 16GB to be very adequate for my needs, but as I expanded uses of the laptop, I yearned for more memory.
In January of 2024, one of my granddaughters needed a laptop for college and I was able to rationalize an upgrade. I gifted her the M2 Pro and upgraded to a 14″ MacBook Pro M3 Max with 14 core CPU, 30 core GPU, 36GB of memory and 1TB storage.
I regularly use most of the 64GB on my primary system, a desktop Mac Studio M1 Ultra. If this M3 Max were my primary system, it would have been tempting to go with 96GB. I never would have guessed it a few years ago, but I am really getting used to having large amounts of memory.
90% of my workstation needs are met by my primary system, but this MacBook Pro compliments it well. In Geekbench, the M3 Max 14 core CPU, 30 core GPU is faster in single and multi core CPU benchmarks and slower in GPU benchmarks than my M1 Ultra 20 core CPU, 48 core GPU. From my perception, both machines seem about the same which is totally wild to me.
In lieu of a 2nd Apple Studio Display (for a moment) I picked up a 14″ MacBook Pro M2 Pro with 12 CPU cores, 19 GPU cores, 16GB memory, and 1TB storage. I wanted macOS, application, and storage redundancy, as well as portability.
Most of my workstation needs are met by the desktop Mac Studio M1 Ultra, but the MacBook Pro will compliment it well.
This MacBook Pro generally has 50%-75% of the performance of the desktop and obviously is much easier to move. Not only will it expand my on the go computing, but it is the perfect portable DAW, should I ever need that.
The data itself is shared by iCloud Drive and Dropbox.
Mar 9, 2022: Ordered Apple Mac Studio M1 Ultra. Delivery changed a few times, last estimate June 29. Apr 19, 2022: Ordered Apple Studio Display that should deliver by June 3. Jun 3, 2022: Studio Display did arrive on time. Still, I couldn’t use it since the Mac Studio had not <sigh>. Jun 24, 2022: Mac Studio M1 Ultra shipped and could be here tomorrow which will be the 109th day. Jun 25, 2022: Apple Mac Studio M1 Ultra: Delivered!
Holy Shmoly, the Apple Mac Studio M1 Ultra backorder waiting time was super brutal, especially considering the time I spent waiting for a MacBook Pro M1 Max before I changed the order to this Mac Studio M1 Ultra the day after it was announced. Oh well, the best is worth waiting for, it’s over now!
I will say one thing after using the Mac Studio for the better part of 2 days, it’s a dream to use.
Buying severely constrained Apple products
Supply chain/Covid related product delivery delays have really been a problem with Apple. At this point I think it looks like my experience of 109 days from order placement to delivery for the Mac Studio M1 Ultra is among the worst. Currently Apple is estimating up to 67 days.
The Studio Display took a more palatable 47 days. A MacBook Pro M1 Pro recently ordered is scheduled to take up to 51 days.
Though still bad, product delivery delays appear to be shrinking. Be prepared to have a lot of patience. As a general rule, the more advanced the processor and custom the build, the longer the wait.
