Thursday November 20, 2008
Location: Chaco Canyon

Arrived at Chaco Canyon late afternoon yesterday. On the way in I bought some firewood from a Navajo man outside a trading post. I paid five dollars for an armful but as I pulled up to the pile he smiled and loaded me up. As I opened the side door to the van and he just kept grabbing more and more wood. Soon I was asking him to stop.. "Please!" I said, "If you give me any more I'll be driving around with firewood for weeks." He laughed and wished me well on my travels. The people down here so far seem to be generous and wonderful!

Once in Chaco, I quickly set out to explore the sites before sunset. Immediately I was blown away by the immensity of the of the ruins left behind by the Pueblo dwellers hundreds of
years before my arrival. Chaco was in its prime between AD850 - 1250 and boy oh boy did they build! Not only extraordinary structures with up to four stories high but also major road networks that connected them to other Pueblo villages and cities to the North, South, East and West. What's more is that these roads were not simple foot paths used by traders and hunters but were actually engineered roadways that included steps and massive ramps to traverse canyons that were otherwise impassable.

The communities of Chaco Canyon were thought to be a major nexus for ceremonial, political and religious gathering of information and guidance. The cities within the canyon are all connected by sight lines thought to be for signaling purposes and the structures themselves are aligned with the celestial bodies above. The people who built these villages and cities were definitely very advanced not only in their ability to construct beautiful buildings but also in their knowledge of the landscape the heavens and the natural world around them.

"An impressive feature of Pueblo Bonito is its alignment to the cardinal directions. A line drawn through the center of the half moon shape forms a precise north-south axis and the eastern-half of its southern wall is aligned east-west. On the spring and fall equinoxes, the Sun rises and sets in perfect alignment with this wall.

Dr. Shelley Valdez, a member of the Pueblo Laguna Tribe, explained the importance of the cardinal directions, "(They) connect people, the seasons, the Sun and Moon's patterns, time, nature, the environment, the cosmos, and ceremonial systems. Observance of the cardinal directions and the Sun essentially ensured life by knowing when it was time to plant, harvest, and hunt for example. Pueblo Bonito is a physical manifestation of these ideas."

The Pueblo people grew corn, beans and squash in addition to hunting and gathering. They traded with their neighbors to the four directions and appeared to be quite stable in their ability to survive and prosper. They built dams and channels to capture the limited rain water that fell. They bore holes in the sandstone to store food and built massive kivas for gatherings and most likely ceremonial purposes.

Pueblo Bonito consists of seven hundred rooms and is thought to have housed up to twelve hundred people and this is only one of the many great houses of the canyon. People would have also poured in and out of this central 'downtown' location depending on the time of year and/or periods of trade and harvest.

But then they disappeared.. or rather relocated throughout the southwest. The question was why. How does a population grow, thrive and prosper for hundreds of years only to one day pick up and leave? There are no definite answers to these questions although there is evidence of drought. It was also possible that due to an increased population more intensive farming occurred resulting in soil quality depletion and eventual crop failures. But again there are no easy answers and no writing left on the walls.

What strikes me is the idea of how the human animal is subject to the ebb and flow of nature. These people lived within nature and were tied to its rhythms and processes, and perhaps they understood when it was time to move or perhaps they like many other civilizations throughout history were forced to move as a result of collapse.

I think for the most part the average human being has lost a sense of cyclical time and even linear history. There are places like this throughout the world that serve as reminders that things change, and change is the only constant. There are things happening in the heavens and in nature that affect us here on earth, but we have grown so disconnected. We'd rather watch TV and assume that everything is fine, lock ourselves into the consensus trance, and block out reality in favor of not thinking or experiencing what IS.

Places like Chaco serve as reminders for us here in the present. I feel it would be wise to heed the warnings they offer, because even if the picture isn't crystal clear, it speaks to us of the fact that regardless of what we may do to prepare, we as animals in nature are vulnerable to the tides of change.

peace,
d