Originally posted on Tuesday, July 22, 2014
The halfway point is now in our rearview mirrors, and I’m not sure how to feel. I can’t wait to see my family, my beautiful wife and my amazing daughter, but at the same moment, I hate the thought of leaving. Completely. The thought of going back to the doldrums of life at home is abhorrent to me in so many ways. Less lab time, less bone time, less time with other osteo-freaks. Nevertheless, I must face such a reality of being back stateside, despite my experiences here. Perhaps its not the worst possible thing, I look forward to working with Transect Archaeology again, fnishing the summer out with another pedestrian survey. I look forward to wrapping up my undergrad studies with a GIS certification. Most of all, I look forward to the grad school application, and finding out where I go next and what work I’ll get to be on next. This experience has shown me how little juvenile osteology has been done, even since the watershed work of Lillehammer 1989. seems like the majority of my citations are dated 2012 or later, revealing how fresh so much of this research is. It is truly astounding to get to work in such a manner, and surrounded by people who absolutely share in this enthusiasm. Are colleagues always your friends? of course not, but these ones certainly are, even if a few seem in over their heads, the rest have kept them afloat as much as we all can.
We have completed our second skeletal analysis, and lectures have proceeded from simple inventory to pathologies, reactions, and recent studies. Dr. Jonathan Bethard is an amazing teacher, who has a charisma that he extends to the subject matter that few can match. Katie Woods will herself soon be in such a realm, her assistance has been absolutely indisposable throughout this experience.
This week we have been trudging through our skeletal analysis, and i find it funny how there seems to be two approaches: to utilize our resources and previous knowledge to find an answer, or to appeal to expertise over and over. One results in expansion, one results in degradation.
I have always told people that we are all born knowing only two things; how to shit and how to complain. All else is learned, and I still stand by that. If you fill your head with Jessica Simpson, iCarly breast augmentation, and pokemon statistics, then enjoy that because that is where you peak. If you fill your head with academia, with independent studies, with social and cultural theory, then enjoy that too. Personally, I ate a Kürtoskalács today, so at least I am on the right track, to that degree at least.