1200

Everyone had left Cahokia because the tyrant had made the place run out of corn, and nobody felt like bringing him more deer meat. He was way up on that city of the sun, in the center of all those rivers, and he had everything - gold, women, trinkets, wood, you name it. But it was too easy to wander off and nobody felt like hanging around taking the brunt of his temper, risking dying, why? Just for a little city life?

Back then the rivers all had water. The Rio Grande came up through Texas and then up through central New Mexico to Albuquerque, or what is Albuquerque today, and there was water all the way, birds and fish, and you could sail boats up there. There was a town at Chaco Canyon and they knew how to boil down metal and make jewelry that shone in the sun. You'd bring them plenty of food and they'd give you jewelry and it was a pretty good deal for everyone. They talked about the city of gold down in Mexico, well, that was it. People came from all over.

There were other cities as well; one was out in Nebraska, another in Kansas, and they've just found some of them. If you didn't like Cahokia, you could head out west, eat a few buffalo, land in one of these places, and then just go and pick up some jewelry. Lots of other choices too.

Everyone had boats and knew how to use them. That's why, you could go down to the Caribbean, or Cozumel, if you wanted. The rivers had water.

Of course you had to work out the details of the language. Half the time you were using your hands, or looking at drawings carved on rock. It was hard enough getting stuff to eat. But trying to figure out these rock drawings, that was crazy. Nobody really knew what they meant. Sometimes they would send you in some direction and you'd be thinking there was food right around the corner, but instead, nothing. Like those rock drawings were just messing with you.

But that's the way it was. If they'd made it easy, we would never have invented cars.