"This land is your land
This land is my land
From California
To the New York island
From the redwood forests
To the Gulf Stream waters
This land was made for you and me"

--Woody Guthrie
American Depression Era folksinger

Bear awoke in the womb of the earth, where the silence took over whenever the tour guide stopped talking, which was often. Because the Earth was the tour, and the Park Ranger wanted us to experience her. The empty darkness went on forever outside of our flashlights, which made a tiny island of light, deep underground in Carlsbad Caverns, N.M. Bear sniffed the air, as they walked from the main chamber into small passages, past amazing rock sculptures made by Mama Earth from stalagmites, stalactites, and plain old big rocks. Rocks everywhere, with a flow of water here and there. And the air was not musty, but alive with currents drifting through the entire maze universe of caverns and tunnels....