Ancient Cliff Dwellings and Cosmic Reflections
The views were staggering on top of the mesa. Every so often Ronald Wheeler, as he drove around, saw the roadside drop away on one side of his vehicle and expose its majestic, dangerous scenery. Some of the severe vistas almost made him feel like he was about to fly off of the Earth toward the horizon. At night, he looked up at the myriad of stars in the Milky Way to find the Ursa Major, the Big Dipper. From there, he could find Polaris, the North Star, and know what direction he was facing. He felt eyes staring back at him from all those lights. That made him shiver from the exposure and nakedness of his staring. As if he walked in on a woman undressing.
He knew that those stars were not even in that same location or time. They shone on him as beams of flickering light waves left in the wake of passing black holes and other celestial objects like ships in the ocean. Earth was a massive vessel being pulled along by a traveling star. Or perhaps akin to a pilot fish and a whale. Those objects already went off to wherever they were headed, too. They were being guided by whatever massive objects captained their vessels. Was this mesa the conning tower for this planet?
In the daytime, the cliffside Pueblo city recessed into a 1000-meter of natural sandstone was beautiful and stark. It had dun-colored square houses and circular courtyards punctuated by the dark greens of conifer trees or shrubs. The dwellings had T-shaped windows as eyes with turkey vultures as corneas. No one knows why the ancient city was left deserted or where its people went.
The T-shaped windows found in the cliff dwellings preserved at the Mesa Verde National Park were likely used for both light and ventilation. It provided stability and allowed the residents to open and close the windows as needed. The unique shape also helped to deflect wind and protect the interior of the dwelling from the elements. Additionally, the T shape may have held symbolic or cultural significance for the ancient Puebloan people who lived in the dwellings as many of the doorways were also shaped in this manner.
Black turkey vultures stood sentinel in the alcoves of that ancient civilization and every branch of the surrounding trees at the Spruce Tree House Terrace dwellings. One younger vulture had the least desirable place to sit. Its spot was dappled and upwind. Discontent made the carrion eater circle about the canyon floor only to return to the same spot. Each circle produced the same result. No better places to roost.
Its roundabout flights are a metaphor for Ronald Wheeler’s reason for being here. He has stayed at the Far View Lodge on the top of the Chapin Mesa at the Mesa Verde National Park for a week. He was meeting with a group that was interested in his invention. Each day, he made his way to the Spruce Tree House parking lot, a few miles down the road from the lodge. When he wasn’t in meetings, he sometimes sat in the shade of the terrace overlooking the trail to the ruins where he liked to think. When the day’s meetings were over, he circled back to the lodge.
Today was the final meeting being held with the curators of the Chapin Mesa Archeological Museum. The obsidian artifact was important to many people and the right parties had to be in them. There were pre-meeting meetings for those. He didn’t realize how tired he became and had dozed off. He was dreaming now, he suddenly realized lucidly.
"Ron?" a small voice said.
Wheeler jumped awake and brushed himself off.
