Just days to go! After sending off the "Final instructions" e-mail to the diggers---thinking it was my last---I realized I have at least three more loose ends to tie up. Will it ever end? Nancy says she gets more depressed about not going this year with each passing day. I was that way too, until I read Kristina's first blog entry and was reminded of the bugs, other wildlife (sorry, Glenn! I know their presence is of great interest to you), and the sunburn. I will NOT miss those first few days when scorpions show up as people disturb the rocks on the surface, nor will I miss exposing my fair complexion---my father's redhead gene may be recessive for my hair color, but not my skin type---to the blistering sun. Of course, I packed #30 sun screen and applied it liberally, but no sun screen is sweat proof, so it was a losing battle. I looked like a beet the first couple days, and everyone was worried I was coming down with heat stroke.
And there are other things I won't miss. When Mark and I were in Evansville, Indiana earlier this month for a Schuler family visit, we did the 2007 Hippos report during the Bible class hour at his home church. My section of the presentation was titled "all the dirt on the dig." I talked about the daily routine and commented (as the plate of breakfast food came up on the powerpoint presentation) that people do not come back as volunteers year after year because of the cuisine. I will not miss the mediocre kibbutz food nor the ambience of the breakfast hall---an abandoned 1940s Israeli Defense Force building with every surface covered in pigeon manure.
But I do have regrets about not going this year, mostly about the people. Participation in the dig builds a sense of community among the diggers that transcends the generations. I wasn't surprised to see the warmth between Linda and Nancy at the Newark airport last year. Since the two were the only "mature" (aka, over 40) adult women on the 2005 dig, a bond between them was natural. However, I was surprised to learn this spring from Amanda Bundy, a CSP student from Hibbing, Minnesota, that Arny Friend (who's from the St. Louis area and nearly old enough to be Amanda's grandfather) and his wife made a point of looking up Amanda and her family when they were visiting his wife's relatives in the Hibbing area. The Bundy and Friend families went out to dinner together. Apparently, during brief week that Arny and Amanda were both at Hippos, the two had a conversation about family and concluded they might be related---that was enough to cement a relationship that now extends to their families! Then a couple of weeks ago in casual conversation, Andrea Chandler mentioned that, when she's on her way back to St. Paul after visiting her mother in western Nebraska, she always stops in Wayne, Nebraska and has lunch with Nancy. Okay, after visiting her mother, she stops and has lunch with another woman old enough to be her mother! I will miss getting to know a great group of people this year. I'm counting on the on-site bloggers to fill us in not only on the finds on from the NE church but also on the stories that reflect the building of community among the diggers.
By the way, last night Nancy and I talked by phone (discussing what, exactly it is, about which we are supposed to blog). Nancy, who's already planning to return next summer commented: "I hope they have a good season but don't find anything too spectacular until next year." I'm hoping for no lost passports, no trips to hospital emergency rooms, and no emergency evacuations of diggers this year!
I'm seconding that "no emergency evacuations of diggers this year" hope...