Hummingbird Makes the Night Sky

Grown weary with the incessant fighting among Bear, Coyote, and Eagle, the Creator threw his cloak over the world plunging it into darkness; the first darkness the world, and the animals, had known.  Each in their turn, the three begged forgiveness, but to no effect. The world remained in darkness. Then, out of the dark emerged a small voice, "I can do it."

The other animals could hardly believe what they saw and burst into laughter at the sight of the tiniest, most pathetic looking creature they had ever seen. Bear said, "you will never succeed, my little friend I am a great warrior and I was unable to make my pleas heard. Stay here where it is safe."

Hummingbird ignored the laughter and jests of the other animals and began his flight. Flapping his wings furiously he reached the Creators' cape and punctured it with his sharp beak. In exhaustion he fell back down to earth. The others looked up where a tiny pinprick of light shone through the darkness.

After resting a bit, Hummingbird flew skyward again, and again, each time puncturing a new hole in the cape. Hummingbird made thousands of flights, creating thousands of pinpoint holes.

Eventually, Hummingbird did not return to earth. The animals grew apprehensive, until the Creator appeared before them cradling Hummingbirds small body in his hands. Hummingbird's heart so impressed the Creator that in honor of the fallen warrior He covers the earth with his un-mended cape for half of the day, every day.

I did just a quick gravel ride on Sunday, bushwhacking a bit afoot, treading along the top of some levees. Google Earth seemed to show something of potential interest, which turned out to be a bust, but the exploration did lead to another little head wall and check dam, this one with an upright concrete cylinder which, I am guessing, was once used to gauge the flow of water at that point in the wash. Then there was an old section of gabion wall next to one of more recent construction. Most unusual of all, perhaps, were the cluster of ferns, of all the improbable places, right there in the middle of that dry wash. And then, stopped alongside a rather scraggly looking Indian Tree Tobacco plant, and just as I was about to kick off again and pedal away, I noticed little hummingbird, flying from one long-throated flower and the next, resting now and again, before getting back to business. His ruby throat was a dead give-away, brilliant and iridescent. I was afraid he would immediately flee if I took a moment to change to a color setting, so left the camera on monochrome. Turned out, though, he was not the least annoyed at my closeness and so I watched for several minutes.