A friend of mine from the those other days every so often drops me email or calls. He used to travel up to Alaska every year doing physical anthropology. I called him “bone man” but he’s Theo. I met him some years ago on a human remains site we worked up around Redding, CA. It was a rich site, damaged by what the California Native American monitor called Pirates, Graverobbers, and Extortionists. Otherwise known as PGE. But PGE paid for the work perhaps out of conscience or federal environmental law. Not sure which one. Theo and I shared a hotel room in this small town and every day came back covered in this red dust. We would park it in the hotel bar and the regulars would see us coming and cast the usual jokes about our appearance and lifeline. They were rough and ready but friendly. I remember snippets of the conversations,
Hey, look who has arrived. Its our rich boy scientists.
Yah. They look tired… And thirsty…
Hey rich boy scientists. Want some hot milk to help you sleep?
We’d all laugh and we would buy a round of drinks. Those guys would have “boilermakers” and we’d do a few rounds of draft beers.
If you have read this puny attempt at a weblog, you probably remember me discussing how archeologists do like to drink. And not warm milk either. We would sit after the jokesters left for dinner and have a few more beers. Sometimes it would be Thursday and we would not be working Friday; so we’d stay longer for dinner. Other days we would leave for home. We worked a variable schedule. On the days I left for home, I remember driving home caked in the red dust.
I’d get home and my wife would draw a bath and have a cold budweiser for me. I think I mentioned that archeologists do like to drink beer 
. We would start talking about the “archeology” and the doing of it. Its an active thing you see. Its doing archeologiy in the active sense. Being an archeologist is more than just reading 10 books and getting a degree. Its a way of thinking and doing and living. I felt the most connected those days with friends, family. It just seemed I had it all engaged.
Anyways, Theo and I still take time to talk and its always good. We remember those moments and others. I remember desert moments that Theo never lived through. I seem to dwell more on archeology sometimes. I think I secretly miss it more than what I admit to.
Such it is. It was lesser than and more than and equal to. It was a time of being, a solitary endeavor filled with notables and less than. Some folks I met, I would not choose to be around again. Others though seemed more than. The space they occupied was like one of those burgers. Super-sized.
I started thinking again about it flying back from North Carolina for some reason.Then I remembered that my wife is taking me to the volunteer day at Cal. I get to wander a museum collection. I get to see old friends named Boaz and Kroeber. I get to remember and feel trapped but free.
