Genetic Memories of Manhood Lost

I've always been puzzled by deer heads hung on a wall, or any other animal. As a child, they were terrifying. As a teenager they were a joke. As an adult (ha!) I realize they are a symbol, a connection to a forgotten past, but a past in which our species spent by far the most time: Hunting and gathering. Where a man was a man and it was eat or be eaten.

Cultural context adds to it - the hunting lodge, the camp, the sanctuary of men, away from women and their womanly concerns. The giant moose head hung by the roaring fireplace signifies your prowess as a hunter, or here, as someone rich enough to have a camp with a big fireplace and a giant moose head. Impress the other males, signify your position in the tribe. Yadda yadda.

It made sense for a dude circa 12000BCE; for a lawyer in 2011 from NYC at his retreat in the country? Symbolic to the core, but isn't that pretty much any of us have nowadays? Symbols? As none of us - or an exceptionally small percentage - do anything to actually deliver food, shelter, defense, etc, i.e. those things that once defined every man, woman and child. But for us, we 21st century foxes, nothing is real, all is abstract, and dare I say, absurd.

This picture, yeah?