Chichén Itzá by Tom Drolshagen
It is early morning
and the gates have just opened. The field before the pyramid isn’t yet
crowded with las touristas. It is a good time to come. No buses yet,
just an Iguana stretching across a stone wall trying to pull warmth from
the low sun and the kapok trees chasing long shadows across your
footpath. It will be hot today and the water sellers will be busy, but
you’ll be gone before the real heat arrives. Even the souvenir stalls
are slow to stir. Come in the morning.
The feel of the place is important and you open your palms to the air so that it flows between your fingers as you walk. There is memory here.
You get an inkling of
what is in store for you as you pass below the jaguars
surrounding two upper walls of the temple. The Mayan pictograph for
speech flares out of the mouth of a jaguar as do flames from mythical
dragons. The ball field waits.
According to the guides, this is the largest example of an ancient ball field in Mesoamerica. Death was here as was life. The rings are still there, set in stone and you marvel at the challenge that must have been.
There are special places in the world and Chichén Itzá is one of them. I call it place memory and can feel it carried in the ground and rocks and trees and from the depths of the cenote. It can be a whisper or a shout. At Chichén Itzá, with me it is a shout. If you know how to slip into alpha and shut off the internal conversation that always seems to dwell inside ones head, the voice of the crowd can still be heard: a thousand cheers and the thunder of running feet. I usually describe it as being able to feel the energy flow because that seems easier than trying to explain feeling the memory of a place. The hairs on my arms and neck tingle and goose bumps rise; it comes from the northerly end and is strongest at the center of the field. Breathe through your nose, deeply and slowly: a remembrance of scent?
I
have been to Chichén Itzá only once in the morning and once again in the
evening and the tramp of tourists has dampened some of the memory, but
the memory feeling still lingers. If the gates were closed for a month,
more of the voices would come back. It’s as if violent death or very
strong emotion leaves behind more detectable memory in a place. In
Chichén Itzá, there is fear there, but also pride and what feels like
vengeance. For a little while I could hear them.
Note: The accompanying photos were taken by the author while he and his lovely wife Karen visited Jan and and me in Mexico last March. Tom is a dear friend and gifted writer, and we hope to present more of his work soon.