As the coldest
and snowiest month in recorded Connecticut weather history draws to an end, I
find myself looking forward to the snow melting more than I ever have before.
Maybe it’s just that I’m getting older, entering my 60th year on the
planet, that also makes me pretty sure this is the longest February that there
has ever been. I never did write up a little highlight of the year 2014,
probably because this spring will mark 25 years of a different way of looking
at stone features on the New England landscape, after “Waking Up on Turtle
Island,” seeing instead of “farmer’s walls and clearing piles” but rather stone
features that may possibly be remnants of the Indigenous Cultural Landscape of
Turtle Island.
So I’m gonna
offer up a little Cabin Fever Reliever since I suspect many of us have come
down with the malady, a little look at what just might be a familiar landscape
to you. Someone has taken a lot of time to research and visit these places, sometimes
giving certain rocks and/or stones names, some of which may even actually be
Indigenous origin – or at least sound like they could be. It’s a pretty
widespread sort of thing in the Indigenous way of thinking, naming stone
features for a variety of reasons, as places where history is remembered or
where spirits live etc.
What is really ironic about this place is that many stereotypes
about Indians were sometimes created and most often certainly reinforced at the Iverson Ranch (sort of near Burbank CA) where all sorts of TV and Movies were filmed. Looking at some of the photos, I think
I see layers of Cultural Landscapes there, just as I do here (under all that
snow).
Some samples:
Mandatory Anthropormorphic Face or Skull:
"The Phantom"
Above: The Devil's Doorway
Below: "Ophiomorphic Doodles" on the Doorway
(Compare to Photo #2 above)
So if you are cooped up in the cabin and feel so inclined, check this out in person:
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