Watching over me?

In my previous post, I mentioned the potential (at least, as I see ‘em) meanings of a series of pictographs.  Now I’m going to throw a bit more fuel on the fire.

You might remember this shot:

 

dancing? Or watching?

 

Now I’m going to give you some perspective over the scene:

 

context

 

You will note the two figures in the upper left hand corner of this image.  Now things might start making more sense…   For those that don’t know, the holes in the floor of the cave are metates – where people would grind up their grain into meal that could be cooked.  I can’t imagine that it was a lot of fun!  Maybe in this context, the two figures above the working area represent the boss man watching over you?

And speaking of watching over your people…

 

view from above

 

The small cave where this picture was taken directly overlooks the working area in the above images.  Can you find the cottonwood tree in the middle left?  Now look at what appears to be small hills next to, and behind the cottonwood tree.   That little section of hills contains several shallow caves, including the cave  with the metates.   Now was this last spot a place to watch over the workers?  Maybe a place to survey the tribe or family group?  Again, it’s enough imagination time to keep you thinking for a while!

For me, on the day that these images were shot it was a brutal.  Temps were in the low to mid teens and any time that we were exposed to the wind for more than a few minutes any skin that was exposed started going numb.   The time we spent in the cave that overlooked the working area was simply glorious.  As my buddy Bruce told me, “this is why we do this stuff.”  The cave was in the direct sun, out of the wind and the view – as you can see – was fabulous.   The little pocket of heaven made freezing our tails off for the afternoon all that more worthwhile.

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~ by Derrick Birdsall on March 9, 2011.