I think I first found it in '92. Or maybe '93.

Looking for a strutting ground that consultants had spotted from the air. As usual, their location was less than exact, and all I knew was the birds were strutting somewhere in this square mile. Spent more mornings than I should have trying to find the lek, ending up one morning on an extremely faint two-track trail on the edge of the basin. And soon found us driving on small dunes of dark loess.

Not sand, mind you, but dunes of windblown dirt. The exact texture and colour of Hershey's powdered chocolate (not the cocoa mix, but the actual chocolate). Tires sank in several inches as we slowly drove across the shrubs trying to eradicate our two ruts. And there I saw it, just off the road.

A rock.

A flat chunk of sandstone, out here where no rock could exist.

Unless someone put it there.

So, I stopped. And as the heeler of the day circled around doing her usual snooping, I checked my discovery.

A metate.

Otherwise known as a grinding stone. A flat stone with a shallow basin in it that an Indian woman would have laid grain or corn in, and then crushed with a rounded hand stone. The "mano", if I remember right.

Now, this is just about the Holy Grail of Native American artifacts. A piece of prehistory to set alongside the fireplace. Almost every arrowhead hunter's dream, other than a Clovis point.

Wow.

I left it.

Yep, I left it there. Not really sure why, but I did. Certainly not because it is illegal to remove it. Because who would know? But there was something about finding this stone that was special, much more so than the stone itself. To know the owner of this stone was here, in this same soft chocolate soil.

Of course, I kicked myself over that decision afterward. I mean, those things are cool! And valuable. And I just knew somebody else would find it, and take it, and have a great discovery. Thought about that stone, laying a short distance away, every year that I stopped by to check that strutting ground.

So, some years later, after checking the strutting ground that I eventually found, I went back. Back down that same trail, even more faded, once again leaving deep tire treads in that chocolate powder.

It was still there.

As I tried to pick it up, I found it was cracked. In half along the narrow. And the smaller piece was flaking apart along the natural layers of the stone.

Perhaps this is why she left it. Wouldn't be much good if your grounded grain tasted of stone, or fell through a crack. And it'd been a long time. Small lichens were already starting to cover the grinding surface. Centuries this stone has been laying here, testament to some unknown woman's passing.

Still, you could still tell what it was. Still a valuable artifact.

I left it. Again.

I don't know why.

So. Over the years, the strutting ground has gone inactive. A federal biologist tells me he thinks the grouse have shifted over to a nearby ridge. Been in that section of land several mornings again this spring, looking for the new site, just as I did a decade ago.

Haven't found it.

But the gas field is there, now. Gas wells all to the east, and now the north. A drill rig actively drilling just to the south. And well pads prepared and waiting to the west.

Someone's gonna find my metate, I just know it. Time to pick it up.

So, this past week, after another unsuccessful search for the new strutting site, the heeler sisters and I went back down that faint trail, barely distinguishable now. And stopped in the chocolate dunes. Which the heelers just loved, so soft to run in. And there was my metate.

Right where I left it.

Right where she left it. Centuries ago. It's crumbling fast, now. Barely recognizable. Probably been stomped on by feral horses or elk, since they both like this country. Or maybe cattle.

I left it. Again.

I don't know why.