Living History

This photo was taken in Bone Canyon, a small isolated side canyon off the Rio Grande Gorge. So small as to hardly be noticed by the casual hiker, the children know the canyon's most intimate details, much like a band of hunter-gatherers might have known it a few thousand years ago. The petroglyphs which sparsely populate this little canyon bear witness to those ancient wanderers (and others more modern - thank you, R. B. Vigil).

The stone bowl in which the children are playing is almost two feet deep and is nearly always full of water. In spring and summer we find tadpoles there. I wouldn't go so far as to suggest that some ancient folks carved it out on purpose, but I have no doubt that their children's fingers plumbed its depths just as ours do.

For these children, it is their first history lesson. We don't teach it. We live it.