2007 in Review, Part 1

Well guys, my blog has survived through the holiday season!! Though it has seen its highs and lows (read, long time without posts), I am refusing to let it die. It is very important to me that I continue writing and getting my feelings out for the world to see. Every person out there who reads this, you know who you are, gives me the impetus to keep putting the figurative pen to the figurative paper. I believe that since this blog has begun I have become much better at translating my rather confusing thoughts into coherent and cogent sentences and paragraphs. I daresay that it is also helping me out with my thesis and other school-related writing.

2007 was a very big year for me in many disparate ways. It was the first, and last, full year of graduate school combining the fears and doubts of the beginning of graduate school with the resolution and the forward thinking of the end of graduate school. It began with tragic heartache with the death of my grandfather Louis, a man beloved and honored by multitudes of people in and around the Cincinnati area. His funeral was difficult, especially since it combined with a different type of heartache associated with the necessity to leave all my family here in Ohio (especially my wonderful Jess) and relocate for yet another semester of graduate school down in Las Cruces.

Perhaps as a way to cover this inauspicious start to the year, I tried to delve deeper into my school and work my way through the semester with the endgame in mind. This was the quarter where I really solidified my thesis topic and my schedule aimed at getting me out of there by Spring '08. As far as my grades were concerned it worked and I earned straight A's that semester: a feat that I have rarely accomplished over my academic career. Though I would have loved to have been able to come home and spend the entire summer at Jess's side and visiting friends and family, I saw an opportunity to ensure that I would be able to graduate on time. The difficulty arose when I realized that my Geography minor added an extra six credits onto my schedule, which would have kept me in school until the very end of 2008. In order to alleviate this, I signed up for a six-week field school that was set to take place in Deming, NM an exceedingly tiny town rife with prehistoric Native American artifacts.

This field school was an important step in my education as it made me realize how little love I had for field archaeology. While I may have had moderate success with the theoretical aspects of Archaeology and Anthropology, such as the nature of culture and unilinear evolution, I realized real quickly that I did not enjoy working in the dirt with toothbrushes. Ironically, I seemed to enjoy the paperwork more than the actual fieldwork. I have reached halfway through the year of 2007, and this is looking like a fairly long post already, so I'll end it here and just ask you to wait with what I am sure is baited breath for my next posting where I chronicle the continuing adventures of Sean Arata, Archaeologist!!! (cue Indiana Jones music).

Before I go, I would like to send my regrets to a dear friend of mine who's grandmother passed away over the Holidays. I'm sure that her and her family are still reeling from this great loss at such a joyous time. My thoughts are with them in this time of need.