First Day of School

Wednesday morning. Alarm sounds at 09:00. I'm excited, but nervous, and the cats are confused. I have kept a waking up at noon schedule for years. I double check my e-mail inbox for any word. Hmmm. The professor of Latin American history has said I can join his class. Awesome. Another quick check of maps, schedules, and locations. Coffee. Clothing. And out the door.

w00t.

It's a grey, rainy day and I regret the lack of a hat. There will be no umbrella carrying for me. Oh no. This disdain for an umbrella happens when you marry a native Pacific Northwesterner. (He calls himself a "webfoot.") Off to school.

I join the long line of cars making a left turn onto the campus. The road goes uphill with loopy, lazy turns that I look forward to riding a motorcycle up one of these days. I pull into the daily lot, my $3 in quarters jangling in my pocket and ready to go. Daily parking pass, paid and put on dashboard.

I walk into the first class--ANTH330--the one where the professor didn't reply to my e-mail. There's a nice student who confirms that it's the correct class, and let me look at her syllabus. I sat through the lecture--which was interesting, all about the discovery of Lucy (Australopithecus afarensis)--and booked up to the professor at the end of class. He was very nice, signed my form, and gave me a syllabus.

All right. Ten minutes to the next anthropology class. Happily, it's one building away.

Made it to class two--ANTH101--a good survey course of the field. We watch at couple of old Jane Goodall films--they're dated, but interesting. Both are all about the chimpanzee troupe she studied in Gombe. I went running after the professor and got my form signed. Yay!

Ten minutes to the next class. Happily, it's one building away.

Class three is HIST409; American environmental history. It's a totally new field, studying how environments affect human populations that develop within them. It also goes into changes that humans make to their surroundings and how that affects the ecology. There were two guest speakers from the Ridgefield Wildlife Refuge. Informative, and they're looking for volunteers. I hope that I can get some field time up there to go with the archaeology portion of my anthropology degree. The professor signed my form at the end of class, and asked me to e-mail him to arrange a time to meet so I can get caught up. Fabulous.

Ten minutes to the next class. Happily, it's next door. Literally the next classroom. Hurrah!

Class four, and the one that ends my day, is HIST331--cultural history in Latin America. The professor made it to class a little late, but passed out a crap-load of papers (including a syllabus) at the beginning of class. We watched portions of Eisenstein's long-lost film about Mexico made in the late 1920s (¡Que Viva Mexico!) and some portions of La Otra Conquista. I'm really excited about this class, particularly since Latin America is a big mystery to me. I know a little about the pre-conquest civilizations--thanks to my continuing interest in archaeology--but very little beyond that. The professor also signed my form.

SCORE.

Next stop, my adviser to drop off my paperwork, and home. But first, chiropractor. Did I mention that I tweaked the hell out of my back last Sunday? Oh yeah, I did that. Ouch and ouch. On top of running around campus and getting all ducks in rows.