Archaeologists are wonderfully creative people with wild and very vivid imaginations.
We can be out there early in the morning, already hot, already feeling the sweat in the crooks of our knees, cranky and caffeine-deprived, and you will already be able to hear detailed theories about what we're uncovering. Crackpot theories and jokes, or serious-faced educated guesses, they're all interesting.
I can't tell you much about what we're doing (I've asked the field directors, but not the higher-ups, so I'm erring on the side of caution; the background is all here) but I can give you a little context: we found some connected, in-context bones that first day of proper digging last week, but not much else since then, and nothing connected to the original bones. So, whilst bemoaning the lack of anything new (or anything else to help us make sense of our pit), the following exchange occurred:
Pit Partner: "Ooh, well, maybe there's a pagan cult we've never heard of!"
Me: [deadpan] "There always is."
It drew a laugh and much talk of Indiana Jones, and I think I'm going to add it to my ever-growing collection of Dialogue I Must Use In Something.
In all seriousness, though, we have a bit of background on the site and a general time/place understanding of the setting, but we're digging up some really weird and varied situations. There are a few theories floating around from the directors/people who actually know what they're doing, but the rest of us are just making it up as we go along. And when I say making it up, I mean pulling it out of our butts. It's a little frustrating not actually knowing what's going on, but it's ridiculously entertaining to hear everyone's comments, and I'm content to just laugh and write them down.
Lounging during lunch and writing everything down in my little Field Notes notebook that mama gave me. (Everyone loves it and is totally jealous of me. Good job!)
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