Research That Leads Only To Questions

Stick with me to get your name in a drawing for the first ever in the known universe give away of Deep Trouble. (How sad that I suspect I need to bribe you to read this thing!!!!!)

I thought I’d talk a little about research today. My main reason for doing this is because the research I found while writing my May release Deep Trouble was both fascinating and annoying.

Deep Trouble takes place mainly in the Grand Canyon. My heroine is searching for a city of gold, the lost city of Quivera. My hero is trying to keep her alive until she comes to her senses. The only way he can figure to prove to her there’s no city of gold in the Grand Canyon is to take her there and keep her alive until she admits she’s a lunatic. At which point she’ll come to her senses (he hopes) and then he plans on marrying her. This is a plan that has Gabe a little nervous, what with him planning to marry a crazy woman, but there aren’t that many women around and he’s lonely.

When I’m researching things I find myself often becoming inexplicably sarcastic. I have a problem when historical events are looked at through the prism of modern sensibilities.

So, I found these rock paintings and/or petroglyphs. And that annoyance kicked in pretty hard. At first you see them and read about them and there’s reverence. They are very ancient. These are messages passed down in stone from a people who didn't write words, but could still tell their stories.

Others looking at the petroglyphs lower their voices, speak in hushed, respectful tones.

Me? Queen of Sarcasm? Nah!

I think, "Wow, graffiti is nuthin' new. You darned kids, get offa my lawn. Put down that can of spray paint! I'm calling your mother!"

What do you suppose prompted ancient people to carve in stone seemingly useless things? I mean if you're going to the trouble of getting your chisel out, you'd think you'd use your time wisely. (Aside: Did ancient people have chisels?) Of course that one ... thing ... (left) looks kind of like a man with horns and a tail. Okay I can only think of one guy like that and it is a very...shall we say...fire and brimstone connection.

So yeah, if they see him, sure I get that they might need a painting. But why carve a herd of goats? Surely a herd runs by the cave entrance every fifteen minutes. It'll take hours to finish the carving. Just wait at the door and point.

Did they worship the goat? Could the goat defeat He-Who-Has-Horns-And-A-Tail in a battle? Were they marking the cave as their territory during a war? Was it a symbol of relationship? "Marry me darling and as God as my witness, you'll never be hungry again. I could go shoot a goat to prove it but let me carve one in stone instead."

These are all questions asked by scientists, better known as He-Who-Has-Too-Much-Spare-Time. They spend decades trying to decipher the painting of the goat.

This one on the right is found in the Grand Canyon. And since my heroine is trying to convince the hero that there is a city down there, proof of human life definitely strengthens her hand.

The most confusing part of this picture is...that looks a lot like an alligator to me. An alligator and...carrots?? Carrots? Okay, sure they could've had carrots. But alligators in the Grand Canyon? Hello? It’s a desert. No swamp to be found anywhere. Or no, wait, not an alligator. A man. A man with a tail, look at the bottom left 'man', dancing. Doing the Hokey Pokey, I'd say. Put your tail in, put your tail out, put your tail in and shake it all about. I don’t know about the rest of the country but I’m from the Midwest. Suddenly this is a drawing of a wedding dance...and they're serving....carrot cake?

Except hold on, that’s not a alligator/dancing long-tailed groom, that’s a swastikas.

Uhoh, those crazy cave men!

I've always heard that the swastika is a really ancient symbol that was perverted by the Nazis (they did one heck of a good job with that, didn't they?) What else is interesting is how much the Not-swastika looks like the alligator man. Really look at it a while. It's not really a swastika, it's a double swastika. Two arms, two legs, even a head. I find that fascinating. One arm up, one leg kicking. It's not a man an alligator or a swastika, it's a cheerleader. This is right before the big game and someone's written the Paleozoic version of Go Team Go on the wall. (Go Gators Go?) So maybe Swastika's aren't even anything important, just team spirit captured for a lifetime.

(seriously people you ought to see what I can do with a Rorschach Inkblog Test, it's not pretty)

Which leads me to this one. All I see when I look at this are fingerprints on my wall. I've got this image of an ancient mother, chasing after her forty kids with a bottle of pre-historic windex and a sponge.

That's right, it's not meaningful and important. It's just a MESS. What we now research and revere was probably gossiped about back then.

Over the stone picket fence, two old crones whispering, "Did you SEE Ork's walls? She's a terrible housekeeper. If she can't keep things neat they shouldn't have had so many children. Why just the other day, her son knocked over my favorite swastika with his tail."

Here are some quotes I found about petroglyphs and pictographs:

Scientists can tell how old the pictographs are, but not the petroglyphs. (Mary: Why don't they admit they are just guessing???)

Native Americans used rock painting as a way to record their beliefs and observations of the world. (Mary: Translation...meaningful, reverent, important...no mention of graffiti)


Rock art sites inspire visitors to wonder about the people who made the images and the messages they may have been trying to communicate. (Mary: Or get the windex, whatever)

Painting and Petroglyphs in the Grand Canyon. Seemingly random doodles (Mary: STOP! NO! Resist the urge to further analyze. You've got it right!)

These glyphs have played a prominent role in attempts to understand forager religious iconography. (Mary: But no, of course they couldn't resist)

They were possibly intended to supernaturally increase success in the hunt. The mountain goats drawings bolstered the “hunting magic” hypothesis. (no one's talking about the horned dude. Nooooooooo it's alllllllll about the goats.)

You may be surprised to find out I'm NOT invited to be a visiting lecturer at a university near me to talk about my petroglyph research. But I'm sure they've just lost my phone number. If I had it to do over again, I'd've carved it on their wall.

The end.

So has anyone ever seen petroglyphs? There's a much-written-upon stony wall in a bluff near our home. Most of it is just kids carving their initials. But the rumor is that Louis and Clark wrote on that wall, marking their trail.

Graffiti, for a good cause.

Leave a comment about research

to get your name in a drawing for a signed copy of

Deep Trouble.

I haven't gotten my author's copies yet,

but when I get them today's winner will be FIRST!
A little bit about Deep Trouble
Gabe Lasley has left his ranch in Wyoming because of his strong feelings for a married woman. He finds Shannon Dysart stranded in a mountaintop cave and saves her. She is on a quest to prove her father’s research isn’t the work of a madman, that he really did find a treasure in the wild west.


With trouble on their back trail from the villains who still want Shannon’s map, the dream of gold coloring every decision Shannon makes, and Gabe’s surprising need to protect her, they sets out to find

a city of gold. Along the way they find that true treasure is rooted in love. And that was within their reach all along.
http://www.maryconnealy.com/