Week 2, Session I

Let's see. Tuesday, our Monday, was not rainy. It was one of the nastiest humid days in recent memory, though we have had some corkers lately. For a change, we did NOT lay out the grid again in the south; people dug. Mostly they found slag and clinker.




It is not a very big site -- the north end.


Seth, reading the manual(!).

The day started out neither too hot nor too humid, but I felt like a zombie, possibly a Benedryl hangover. As time passed, people began flaking out, turning pale with flushed cheeks. I got a headache and decided I was a weenie, until Dick announced that he wasn't feeling well, either. He blamed the dust. We folded up a bit early, and most of us reassembled at Matt's house for a well-behaved but very pleasant evening.

The next day was the first of three (two have passed) for me and Lauren at the lab. She, after taking and editing pictures of about eighty pieces of pottery, has developed a real sensitivity to the surface treatment. Some of this, to the unconverted eye, seems fanatical, but she was undeniably right about the deep-background fabric impression. I hope to learn from her.

The first day's worth of (4) people were subject to her and my (primarily my)not being quite ready for prime time. We have a good but very slow printer at the lab, and there were a number of useful code sheets, among other things, we had not nailed down. They were patient about this, unless you count the one I had literally to keep waking up.
We got through "Introduction to Pottery," and I printed out most of the relevant pages from NativeTech.com and put them in a folder. Not only do Today's Youth often not know what a plumb bob is (or a bayonet-- weren't their Barbies ever drafted?), but not all of them made clay coil pots in third grade art class. No wonder the country is going to hell in a hack. Actually, the first day of lab was an object lesson in how much I know that I do not know I know, and assume everyone else knows, too.

I will post a picture of a catalogue card soon, so you will all have the warm fuzzy feel. We did a fair number yesterday, maybe 30; today, with a team of 2 interns (as well as Lauren) and a volunteer who has catalogued pottery for the last two or three months, I believe, and a non-sleeping, hardworking pottery-loving Sam, we got through almost a hundred catalogue numbers. Nearly all of them involved slag, clinker, coal, glazed pottery, glass, or nails. Dick has agreed they need to find better stuff.

He and the lab have been in frequent touch by cell phone. Though we have to be in Concord while they are in Manchester, at least I do not feel cut off from them. Today's team said unkindly that they had greatly enjoyed yesterday, with fewer people on site and more chance to get their questions answered. I supposed it is good to draw off some of the throng, but I would not mind being there crooning over the finds as they come out (at least the non-industrial waste). On the plus side, we can have teabreaks as God intended and I am in Concord and able to do errands before going home.