So as I'm looking at these lizards, in their five by ten foot tank, and I'm wondering, what's the point of all my thoughts? These lizards have certainly slid across every millimeter of their man-made fifty square feet, and now there's no land left to explore. Maybe we were given so much land because we weren't meant to see it all. We were meant to be able to still wonder, to imagine.
The Mexican bearded lizard, known for it's colorful, bumpy and beaded skin, was formerly found through the Southwestern U.S., but now it is only found from Mexico to Northern Guatemala. The lizard has glands in its lower jaw which release venom by capillary action along its grooved lower teeth, in effect, chewing venom into its prey. There is no anti-venom for the bite of this lizard, though human death is rare.
They no longer appear through the Southwestern U.S. It is a CITES protected animal, protected under the same Animal Welfare Act, as it is endangered by its collection and habitat loss and careless murder. The bearded lizard has a plethora of superstition and myth. It is incorrectly believed to be the most venomous animal, and that it can create lightning strikes with its tail. Stranger still, the lizard is believed to be able to make a pregnant woman miscarry at it's gaze, as many things with scales in myths cause harm just by eye contact.
For this reason, locals have killed the lizard
on the spot.
Also, the rare lizard is poached through animal trade. We kill the animal and sell its corpse for our own profit, for pieces of paper which make us richer. The animal does not reproduce well in captivity, so it very likely doesn't reproduce well in the zoo either. It's scarcity means a very high price for collectors. Though it is too late for the United States, this lizard is protected in Mexico by law of category A (very endangered) and it lives within several dedicated protected areas.
As I look into the face of this beaded "monster" it's incredible to me to imagine the men and women who believed and still believe it to be able to terminate pregnancies and cause bad weather. I'm busy being curious about the steps, about the land, because I want to know. Nothing more. Why didn't anyone want to really know this animal before they kill it? I have no reason to think stepping and walking is an injustice to the earth. I have no reason to think a calamity will fall from the stars if I pick a plant. I'm not inclined to get behind the philosophy of how we sometimes believe we own things simply by touching or living alongside them, but sometimes it's fun to pretend. My curiosity's nature is that of physical evidence and matter. Of mattering and the physical matter. Somehow a footprint in the sand is a solidifying action to me, as silly as that seems, even if it is blown away in a sandstorm, melted in the snow, the print is still there. I'm sorry, science, but this is what I believe. A mammal's steps are somehow deeper than the first and second layers of the earth, the crust, deeper than magma in the core, and I have no science to back that up, I have no reason to feel a certain way, and I have no scientific reason to feel sad about what we've done to these lizards, but this is the science of emotion.
We've headed to Seattle, and while I'd love to reflect on the awful flight experience or coming to terms with my interpersonal relationships, I can only reflect in this way:
He who journeyed through the airport.
He who arrives two hours and thirty minutes early- he feels only on time.
He who realizes his expectations don't frequent reality.
He who journeys and feels so sad about the beauty in this world. Of people and animals and their expressions alone which could reduce him to tears.
Why tears?
Why sadness?
Why is it that he who speaks freely of ills and ignorance of this world can feel so restricted?
He who notices strong hair follicles, the strong tissues or scales holding a skeleton covering, a woman
SH
SH
SH
Sh
Sh
sh
h
her crying infant as he can only
B
Ba
Bac
Back away.
He who journeys the world in such small ways.
He who loves this world so much he hates it.
He who refuses to enjoy himself for fear of seeming strange.
He who notices all the beauty until it turns ugly.
I enjoyed hearing about the cultural myths associated with the lizard. It may seem odd to us now but it is amazing and disturbing how much beliefs like these dominated and still dominate our cultures. Tomatoes, also known in the past as "devil's apple," were thought to cause evil and lusty thoughts. Some still believe certain foods are aprhodisiacs, that a black cat walking in front of us causes bad luck, etc. Perhaps much of this stems from our attempt to connect our lives, our fate, to the nonhuman world.
ReplyDeleteEnjoyed the playing around with language at the end of your blog.
Awesome research here, and sad to read about how the US has killed these lizards off because of our own superstitions and insecurities. Also liked the reflections around what it means to travel, what travels implications are, the worth of all of it. Great post.
ReplyDeleteGreat research. You wrote about the physical creature and the perceived creature too. It is the human perception of a creature that quite often marks it for destruction. Sometimes it is because of fear and sometimes in order to gain the animals power by having a totem or some part of it to eat,
ReplyDeleteThe concept of being on every square inch of a place is cool to think about.
I really, really liked the poem at the end, especially:
ReplyDeleteHe who journeys the world in such small ways.
He who loves this world so much he hates it.
He who refuses to enjoy himself for fear of seeming strange.
He who notices all the beauty until it turns ugly.
These contradictions, these human experiences that you notice and note make us all feel a little less alone for feeling the same. Thanks for that. It was much needed :)
This post reminded me of a map I found discarded at a library in Montreal a few years ago. The map depicts a part of Northern Canada in the early 1900s. The largest river on it is labeled and so are some of the major rapids. What made me so taken with it was the fact that half of it was taken up by a large yellow mass of land labeled "Unmapped Country." At this point in history the river was an important travel route so it made sense that it was carefully documented but the large mass of land to the east of it had yet to be determined important enough to draw to cartographers in the South (i.e. white explorers). I'm sure the Copper Inuit that lived to the Northwest had detailed information about this so called unmapped place. I wonder how much was written down or just passed on by word of mouth.
ReplyDeleteYour meditations at the beginning of this had me wondering how much upmapped country is still out there/who it's unmapped to.