I've been searching through the geologic layers of deitrus on my desk. Each layer takes me back to a different time period in my life. There's the book I was reading when I was pregnant with my daughter. Here are notes from writing my dissertation. Old photographs of an aunt's visit north when I was barely three. An outdated package of hardened gum makes a sound like dead leaves when I crush it in my fingernails.
How would the future archaeologist read my clutter? What inferences will be drawn from the Sean Cassidy Poster from sixth grade? How will they read my later love for Klimt, Escher, and Dali? Is there an inevitable pathway from teeny bopper love to more reserved affections?
How would time travelers read the archaology of the twentieth century? Old wagon wheels supplanted by Model-T's? A million water bottles? What story could these travelers piece together if we were no longer here to decode things?
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