Fingers Crossed

So Monday I had a conversation with Plimoth Plantation about their internship. It sounds like it will be absolutely perfectly amazing, and that they really want me to work with them. Today I mailed in the application, and now my fingers are crossed. Plimoth is the Mecca of first-person interpretation, with them and Williamsburg standing as the cornerstones of the style. I will let you know when I hear anything more!

Follow-up

Also, the dog was handed over this morning to the City of Stonington Animal Control folks. We are planning on calling tomorrow to see if his owners found him. Fingers crossed!







Apparently stray dogs are like gremlins. Don't feed them after midnight. No, he didn't spawn other basset hounds and try to ruin Christmas, but he did cry all night long. All. Night. Long.

Run run run

So part of the whole being in Connecticut interning deal means being half a country away from my boyfriend. The poor guy is used to me not being nearby at this point, in the year and a half we've actually been together we've only been in the same city for about three months. He's been good about staying in Minnesota, whereas my family is in Iowa, I did a May Term in Paris, my grad program is in Cooperstown, New York, and my current internship is in Mystic, Connecticut. We're constantly trying to find ways to stay connected, whether its eating dinner "together" via webcam or watching tv shows at the same time.

We have, however, stumbled across something new that I wanted to share. He's pretty good about exercising, and this morning decided he was going to "run" from his place in Minnesota to mine in Iowa, as by the time he makes it I'll probably be back there for a bit. According to Mapquest its just over 218 miles between the two.

First off, I am super excited for him to give it a try, and I know that running makes him feel good. Secondly, I am HIGHLY competitive, so of course I just let the gauntlet go un-thrown. I will also participate in the challenge, though I have to modify it a bit. Running is out for me, so instead I will be doing yoga or lifting weights. I figure if I were to run, I could do a mile pretty comfortably in about 9 minutes. So, every nine minutes I spend doing yoga or weights will count as one mile. I also have to actually walk to the Y in order to do the weightlifting, so I figure every 9 minutes of that is about half of a mile if I'm going comfortably. All in all, it will be a lot of fun to see who makes it first!

FOUND DOG

The Mystic Seaport security staff and myself found a basset hound this evening at the Mystic Seaport parking lot. If you are missing a basset, or know someone who is, please contact me asap. He is spending the night with us, at the request of the security staff. All of the area animal control/vets are closed for the night. I will take him to the local rescue league or animal control in the morning. We've decided to call him Melville for the time being :)

New Bedford

This week's intern field trip took us to New Bedford, Massachusetts. We had the chance to visit both the New Bedford Whaling Museum and the New Bedford Whaling National Historical Park. It was a really great day, though long and busy. The whaling museum was absolutely fantastic. They have three whale skeletons (technically four, but one was still a fetus when its mother died) hanging from their ceiling. If not properly treated, whale bones secrete the oil that made the animals so popular in the first place. The floor underneath the whales is covered with little drips where the oil has fallen. They have actually begun to collect the oil dripping off of the skull of the largest whale in order to be able to answer more questions for visitors (i.e. how much drips every day).

The museum itself is undergoing a shift in their focus. It was originally started as the New Bedford Historical Society. While they want to stay true to their roots, they also want to be able to show visitors the larger story of whaling. I hope to be able to visit them again in the future and see how this shift has been executed. It looks like they are doing a wonderful job so far. I really enjoyed their new exhibit, The Hunt for Knowledge. I thought it was very well done, and did a great job of balancing the science of whales as an animal with their uses to humans and the efforts to preserve them.

The biggest surprise for the day was completely out of the blue. Nicholas Cage was wrong in stating that there were only two Resolute desks in existence. Obama currently sits at one. The second is in Buckingham Palace. The New Bedford Whaling Museum has the third. Here is intern Dayne trying to see if there are any surprises on the underside of the desk! We couldn't tell. All in all, the trip was excellent. We got the chance to speak with one of the museum's educators, and she answered every single one of my too many questions. But, hey, they are doing some cool things in the museum, and I wanted to know more about it! According to my mother, I've been asking too many questions since I was four, but I don't think it always has to be a bad thing!

The second half of the day was spent at the National Park Service site. I bought a "passport" that can get stamped at every site. I wish I would have gotten one much sooner! I've been to countless sites throughout my lifetime. Now I guess I just have to go back and visit them all over again! We didn't spend a lot of time in their visitor center itself, other than watching their video. It was alright, but especially noteworthy was that some of the scenes were shot here at Mystic! Following the video, we took a brief walking tour of historic New Bedford. I have been on some fabulous walking tours (Boston's African American Heritage Trail) and some that were just okay. This was just okay, but the volunteer was obviously staying well within her comfort zone. I think we probably just caught her on a bad day, and most visitors to the site will not have as much pre-knowledge of whaling as we did. 

After the tour, we got to talk with one of the site's rangers about working within the National Park system. They are definitely one of the big ones of my list of "Where to Look For a Job After Cooperstown". I grew up visiting NPS sites, and have a purple sparkely caboodle in my closet full of junior ranger patches and pins. One of my big "sticky" memories took place at Mesa Verde. I was fourteen, a little older than seven, but it was I believe a defining moment in my path to becoming a museum professional. A ranger pointed to me and told the group that girls my age in that society would have been well on their way to having children and running their households. It was shocking to me, and made me put myself in the shoes of a girl far in the past. It was a striking moment for me, and in large part because that ranger took a moment and made it personal. I want the chance to do that. I want to be able to look at a visitor and show them a piece of themselves in the past. It is a challenge, and you can't do it with everyone, but I think we in the museum field, especially in education or interpretation, live for that "wow" moment, or the one that creates that sticky memory. I hope that, whether my future involves the NPS or another organization (please please please let me find a job!) I will be able to find a way to make those moments happen.