Questions on Archaeology, Part One

So…I have a really fucking cool job. I’ve wanted to become an archaeologist since I was a wee girl in Pennsylvania, and sometimes when I sit back and think about it I get sort of teary. I have my dream job. I love where I work and who I work with. I get frustrated just like anyone does at work, but all in all I’m very invested in what I’m doing and mostly feel lucky to be doing it.

On the downside, it’s not glamorous or high-paying. Also, I generally have to answer a lot of questions whenever I talk about my career (which is common  in D.C.). I don’t mind questions, I just hate having to dominate the conversation, and I hate not knowing if people are interested or just want me to shut the fuck up. So, I’ve decided to use my blog, for the moment, to post a series of questions that I’m asked frequently that might clarify some points about what it is that I do. If I fail to answer a question you might have let me know, and I can either add it to my list of things to post about or respond via comment thread if it applies to the question at hand.

I should state that I don’t speak for all archaeologists with my answers. As with any professions, people have different areas of expertise and interest and follow different theoretical backgrounds and schools of thought.

So, without further ado, the first of many questions/comments that I receive frequently, and my response to it. Enjoy.

1. “Archaeology! I always wanted to dig up dinosaurs!”

Well, that’s great! I’m glad that you have a healthy interest in the past.

As defined by the Society for American Archaeology (SAA), “archaeology is the study of the ancient and recent human past through material remains. It is a subfield of anthropology, the study of all human culture,” (emphasis added).

They phrase it much more nicely than I do, but I normally just say “people, I study people. Mainly the dead ones and what they’ve left behind.”

So…no dinosaurs. I know very little about them actually and would most likely injure myself or fossilized specimens trying to use a pick rather than a shovel. Paleontologists are the scientists that study dinosaurs, and where archaeologists study under the broader field of anthropology, paleontologists study under the broader discipline of geology. To most people it’s a lot of looking at rocks either way, but the skill sets are pretty drastically different. In my opinion there actually isn’t a whole lot of overlap between the two fields other than working outside and looking for old shit (although I’ve never done any paleontological work at all).

This is generally the most uncomfortable thing I have to explain to people. It can be awkward when people start asking me about T-Rexes, and I find that I do a pretty poor job of keeping egos intact when explaining the difference.

Also, it most likely doesn’t help that I keep plastic dinosaur figurines in my car. Whoops.

Seven Things…

One of the people who amuses me the most on twitter, @TBMimsTheThird, tagged me to do the “Seven Things No One Knows About You” meme. Now, there will be some people who know me in real life, not just via twitter or the interweb, who will most likely know some of these things, but I’m trying my best. It’s hard enough to filter through a lot of weird and quirky habits that seem second nature to me now, let alone figure out what is obvious and what isn’t. Also, most twitter folks know few things about me other than my profession, woes involving my diabetic cat, and the fact that I know more than the average person about window glass.

Without further ado, here is my list of seven things.

1. I’m easily embarrassed.

Okay, so the people that know me in real life most likely realize this. It makes me an easy target for teasing, which I generally hate. It all stems from being the youngest of four sisters, the closest in age to me being seven years older. I was picked on a lot, and as a result tend to be very proud of or embarrassed by my highly varied and strange range of interests. I’m terrified to let others know what music I’m listening to (last.fm is quite the exercise for me—I often listen to things in other media players so they don’t show up on the web page). I get all upset when people tell me I’m crazy for liking BSG, or that Gambit is the worst X-Man. It’s always stupid things that concern me the most.

2. I chose my career at age 4.

After long and grueling half-days of preschool I would return home and, on warm days, sit on the enclosed back porch where my mom had set up a high yellow table with a high yellow chair (the type with the fold-down stairs).  On this table sat a small black and white tv, the type with dials and rabbit ears. I would sit here and draw or practice my letters and numbers while watching PBS.

On one fateful afternoon PBS featured a program about Grecian archaeology, during which a team was excavating a large stockpile of olive oil storage jars. For some reason these jars excited my imagination, and from that time on I proudly told my teachers that I planned on becoming an archaeologist. By the time I reached college, my family barely made a fuss about the fact that I’d never make any money doing it.

One of the most frequent lines I hear from people upon learning my profession (along with “oh, you dig up dinosaurs?” and “there are things to dig up HERE??”) is “I wanted to do that when I was little.” Well, I did.

3. I used to pray to George Washington rather than God.

Granted, I’m not religious and never have been, despite having been scuttled through the Catholic Church very quickly to confirmation (nuns overlooked my lies for many years; clearly I did not have a Catholic aunt in Scotland named Leia to take my confirmation name from…that’s another story altogether). At any rate, I was born on February 22nd, George Washington’s birthday, and lived next to Valley Forge National Park. American history was always a creepily important part of my life, and I idolized the first president to such an extent that I taped a dollar bill to my wall and talked to it.

My prayers to the first president were mostly conversational and non-political. It is exactly the sort of thing that the real George Washington adamantly opposed, although I wasn’t that much of a scholar to realize that as a young child.

4. I didn’t realize that I was an anxious, OCD-stricken, anally retentive person until I went to archaeological field school at the age of 19.

These were not traits I developed while at college, but problems I have had since I was a small, “pensive” child. I seriously never realized how tightly wound I was until I started doing lab work. I was frighteningly good I was at it, and it served to highlight my compulsive tendencies (I had my first physically debilitating panic attack while in the lab—the reason for me first seeing a therapist).

Despite this realization, it took me a long-ass time to realize that I’m not the easy-going person I always thought I was. I had never interpreted my inability to complete high school assignments on time as the result of crippling anxiety (which it was) rather than cool indifference (which it wasn’t). I also realized that I was a compulsive hand-washer—a habit hindered greatly by the fact that your nails get very grimy when sifting through dirt all day. I had to acknowledge this problem in order to create new coping mechanisms.

5. I have many files of half-written Persuasion fan fiction on my computer.

I have never posted any of it.

6. As a child I had complex food-chewing rituals.

I had to chew particular types of food on certain sides of my mouth. Sweets and things I particularly liked were saved for chewing on the right side of my mouth. I ended up with more cavities on that side as a result. I occasionally notice myself reverting to these tendencies.

7. I generally fall behind reading books and comic books because I’m too engrossed in the plot lines I make up in my head.

I’m no writer, but I do live in a dream world that I don’t like to talk about with anyone. Generally the stories I make up are related to the things I obsess over, whether they are from movies, music, novels, or comic books. My father still calls me Dorothy because I was so obsessed with The Wizard of Oz as a small child that I made my entire family call me Dorothy, carried around a stuffed terrier, and wore out three VHS tapes of the movie itself. I’m much more private about those inclinations now.

The End.

New blog meant for words and shite.

So…up to this point I’ve stuck with tumblr and twitter. Back during ye ol’ days of college I kept a livejournal account, mainly to keep in touch with people from home that weren’t also attending the same university I was. In the end I was frustrated with how many downer-type whiney things I posted and couldn’t deal with the “woe is me” vibe it all seemed to have.

There’s nothing that contributes to all types of writers-block than actually having somewhere to post, and the fear that no one will actually read it. See? Already whiney. “No one will read my shite, boo hoo, boo hoo.”

Off to a roaring start!