Something About Alice by Drake Koefoed - HTML preview

She did, and Robbie did a GPS on the location.  “What do you want to do after high school, Carol?”

“I want to be a paleontologist.”

“Get your breadth requirements done in a junior college.  Got a pen handy?”

She took out a notebook and pen.

“Look at the catalogs for the universities you would like to go to, and get their graduation requirements.  All of them want English, Math, Humanities, that stuff.  You have to take these courses:  English, Math to Analytic Geometry at least. Intro to Philosophy, Physics, Inorganic and Organic chemistry, and whatever you need to get an A.S.  Before you go to college, you take one semester off and work for Alice if you can get hired.”

“I will.”

“When do you graduate”

“December.”

“Find the date you graduate, apply to the JC. And ask her if she can use you between then and your school start date.”

He handed her an A&D business card.

They went back to the group.  They were sweeping up dust and throwing it down the drop, but not finding anything good.  

Robbie looked at the ground.  “It’s pretty recent, but it might have something nice in it.  I wish I knew when to use equipment and when not.  Those machines will obliterate fossils like the fish.”

“We can jack, we can rip, or we can blast.”

“Yeah.  All the things we don’t want to do.  Mother nature might expose whatever is here, or destroy it.  Normally we do nothing, and let the plates subduct and never have to decide.”

“I can rip a few inches with the big loader, but I can’t tell what I’m ripping.”

“Wind will blow this dust out of here.”

“We know the layer we have to be really careful of.”

“The one with the crab?”

“She found that on the bank, not on that layer.”

“Is it time for them to cycle the rock tumblers?”

“Yeah.  Plus we have thunder eggs.”

They took the gang down to the house, and set them to cleaning the tumblers out.  They had done two rough cycles, so there was lots to wash.  They ran the tumblers with the rinsed off rocks in water with a little dish soap.  Then they rinsed them and the tumbler barrels again.  After lots of rinsing and brushing, they were ready to pick what would go in medium wash.  One of the girls was about to drink from the hose when Robbie stopped her.  “Don’t anyone drink this water.  We have bottled water if anyone wants it.”

Sister Sarah went to the refrigerator and got some out.  She passed them out to those who wanted one, and put the rest of the case back in the refrigerator.  

The girls selected their best rocks for medium grit, and loaded the tumblers and started them.  It was still light, so they were not ready for the lecture.  Dave and Sister Sarah looked over the slab saw, and some nifty things made to hold thunder eggs.  They decided some of the girls could run it.  They cut open a bunch of them, and looked at the crystals inside.  They put them on the vibratory lap until they ran out of space.  Robbie added some grit, and started the lap.

They went outside and picked over rocks until the sun set.  They had a few 5 gallon buckets full they were saving for the tumblers and the trailer was full of pretty good rocks.  The loader had dumped a few 1/3 yard buckets of stuff they didn’t like in the ten wheeler.

The light failed, and they went to the fire on the rise.  Dave set up the camera and Robbie started.  He explained how you would not drink the water from the well because it had natural but dangerous chemicals in it.  How slight exposures to bacteria could be harmful.  The evolution of microorganisms and ultimately life as we know it.  He told them about Clovis man hunting the wooly mammoth with spears.  He offered the amazing idea that a .22 long rifle round could probably kill a T. Rex if it hit just so.  He told them about the weather on Mars and why the moon had all those craters.  He did a little bit on the Spirit World, and he was finished.

The evening was finished with a rain dance by the warriors.  Whether the girls were more impressed by the dance or the warriors is debatable.  It was a great rain dance, and Sister Sarah was not much offended by it not being a Catholic ceremony.

The girls went to their bus.  There was another box of obstacles.  The girls who did not yet have one had to find their copy of Merriam Webster’s New Collegiate Dictionary.  Sister Sarah reminded them that the dictionary had a lot of things in it like grammar and pronunciation aids, and lots of other things people probably never even looked at, not knowing how much you could learn from this fine book.

When they had been gone 10 minutes or so, lightning flashed and thunder boomed.  The rain came down so hard the bus was forced to slow to half speed or so.  The rain continued, roaring down the bus.  The girls apparently thought Sister Sarah was right when she said God would preserve their souls.

Out on the land, little cacti got the water to make them bigger cacti.  On top of the hill, water was running off by the thousands of gallons a minute, and exposing something.

Back at the house, Dave thought to go out and water the cacti since it was clear the cisterns would be full whether he did or did not.  He spent about 15 minutes doing that, and came back in.  Dave and Candellaria took showers in cistern water while it was available.  The shower had feeds from both cistern water and the guck.  Since Candellaria was a princess, she could use the cistern water.  Everyone else used the guck, and then maybe finished with a fast rinse in the cistern water.   Dave sat with Candellaria and had a little Cuervo Gold.  

“Will the bus be all right?”

“Well, he should slow down and I think he will.  This wind is not strong enough to overturn a bus, although it could get that strong.  I hope he knows to do what a cow does.  Face downwind.”

Candellaria called Sister Sarah.  They were already at the school and inside.  Sister Sarah needed to call parents to tell them not to worry.  The weather service said it was not going to storm for long.

They went to sleep.  That did not last very long.  The phones started ringing.  Candellaria took her truck, and Dave took the skid, and started taking calls.  They put some at Juan’s shop, and some at the wrecking yard.  Dave got a call from the State Police about a car in the river.  He got to the site, but the car was almost underwater in a fast current.  The cops didn’t see a way to handle it.

A little car drive through the safety ribbon and slid to a stop next to the skid truck.  Syd got out, and clipped a piece of ½” nylon to a safety belt.  Her hair was tied with a piece of rope.  “Heard it on the radio.  Make my bitter end fast.”

Dave did so, and an officer Zane came to tell her “You can’t go in the water, lady.”

“Shut the fuck up.  I’m not a lady anyway.”

Syd went in the water, and made it to the car.  She opened the downstream door, and pulled the driver out.  “Haul!  Use the winch if you have to.”

Dave and the officer hauled her in.

When they had her almost to the bank, she was yelling at the driver, “Was there anyone else in the car?”

Finally he got the point, and said no.

Someone had called an ambulance and it took him away.

“Slack me, Dave.”

“Ma’am, I think…”

“No you don’t think.  Get the fuck out of my way.”

She went back in the water, got ahold of the car, and told Dave to clip on to the end of her line.  She pulled his haul cable in, and dove under the front end of the car, where she made it fast to the front end.  She threw the line to the bank, where Dave and the officer picked it up.  She swam over, assisted by the line.  She got out of the water, and coiled her line.  Dave hauled the car out, and decked it.  He chained it down.  He took off for Candellaria’s yard, and called in to the state police dispatcher.  “DCJ Towing.  Bringing your car in the water to the yard.  Do you have any life threatening calls?”

“We’re fine.  Please clear when you put that car in the yard, because we have more.”

“10-4.”

His phone rang, and he picked up.  Candellaria was calling.  

“What is going on?”

“I’m headed to your yard with a car I yanked out of the river.  Driver is all right.”

“Did you have an unauthorized person on the scene?”

“Syd came, saved the guy’s life, hooked up the car and left.”

“Politely helping a little.”

“I don’t know why you have to ask.”

“Radio traffic made it sound like someone was mad, Dave.  We need the State Police contract.”

“Would that be the heroic State Police who rescued a man from the river from certain death?”

“I suppose.”

“They are going to get mad at a couple of tow operators because of someone who was never there?”

They ran a list from the State Police of all the cars in traffic lanes and such.  Dave’s next call was an overturned bob tail van a little too big to go on his truck.  Officer Zane was on the scene.  “Hey, dude.  I can put it on its wheels and get it off the road.  I can’t deck it, and I don’t have the stuff to just tow it.  It might be drivable, though.”

“I’ll give you an emergency damage waiver.”

“I’m on it.”

There was no way to get the cable under the side of the truck, so Dave took out one of the bottle jacks and tried to raise it a little, but it just bent the body.  He rigged on the rear axle housing with a cable, and lifted it some, but it wavered rather than twisting.  He threw a chain under it, and bolted it onto the high side rear axle housing.  He set it back down.  He moved around, and rigged to the chain, extending the boom and raising it.  That did it.  A crease in the body from the cable, but it was on its wheels.  Dave got in the cab and tried to start it.  It fired right up.  He took the chain off and rolled in his cable.  “I can’t tow it, Officer Zane.  I don’t have regular straps and stuff, and my girlfriend’s truck is too small.”

“We just need a driver.”

“It’s a CMV.  I can drive it, but what about the skid truck?”

“We can’t drive someone else’s truck.”

“My girlfriend is out towing.  Her dad worked all day.  I’d let a trooper drive my truck, but not some guy from the weeds.”

“Then you don’t have a CDL driver, so we’re stuck.”

“We should probably leave this on by the curb and finish.”

Zane said, “You’re done.  Candellaria has a couple more and she is, too.  Captain wants this scene clear right now.  Everything else can get done tomorrow.  Or real late tonight, because we have a couple of tow trucks coming from out of town.  Will Candellaria let us put them in her yard?”

“Yeah.  We’ve all been up way too late.  Can’t we put this truck in the weeds?”

“Only thing I am not supposed to do.  Wish you had a CDL driver.”

“Well, there is one, but you don’t like her.  She has a Navy license.”

“Oh.  That’s got something to do with her swimming.”

“I’ll call her, but what she will say, I dunno.”

“Give it the old college try.”

“I’m a mustang, not a West Pointer.”

Dave called.  “Where are you, Syd?  Got a request.  Officer Zane, the guy you charmed earlier tonight, would like to come over to pick you up .  You drive a truck to Candellaria’s yard, and the State Police will bring your car to my house.  I’m really tired, Syd.  I’ll do it if you won’t but you’ve been up a little later than me?”

“Deck my car.  It’s cottontail only.  I will drive the wreck to the yard, and he can get a ride from local law enforcement.”  

“She will help.  She sleeps about 3 hours a night and considers it wasted time, because she could be biting the heads off rattlesnakes or something.  But she needs me to deck her car and follow you to the yard, and one of these guys with a police unit that isn’t doing anything can take you back to your car.”

“That’s fine.  

They put the truck in the yard, Zane in his buddy’s car, and the skid truck alongside Dave’s house.

Candellaria came in a little later, dropped in the bed.  She didn’t say anything, and was asleep right then.

Long before Dave was ready, he heard Syd putting her car on the ground, and stowing the hold down chains.  She came in and got her duffel and left.

 

 

“21 Paleontology Revisited”

Musical Theme; Morning has Broken by Cat Stevens

 

Robbie and Dave went over to the quarry in the ten wheeler.  They dumped the junk ¾ clear on the pile, and drove slowly around the hill, with Robbie glassing the hill.  

“Oh, what is this?”

Dave locked the air brakes and leaned over Robbie to glass the bank.  “It looks like bones.”

Runoff water had taken new routes since the cap had been taken off, and the fact was, it was better that way, because if it rained  again, the new wash would cut away a lot of sand and gravel, and probably show some more neat things.  Robbie and Dave climbed the slope.  There was not a lot of mud, and it was not very messy.  They came up to the slope until they reached the bones.  “Dave, can I call a paleontologist friend who will keep secrets?”

“If you are sure he will.  I can look at some scientific specimens going to real scientists.  But not donating our stuff so rich people can look at it and say “Wow, that’s old.”

“Cal is not like that.  He would like to get lot of single bones that are not worth much.  The fish or something, those are ego pieces.  They’re pretty, but a photograph of one of those gives you the layout, and after that, you know your bones, and you measure them for how much stress they would have or so.”

“So your buddy won’t come with some kind of federal bullshit restriction and take this land away from me without paying a dime?

“I don’t think it’s that bad.”

“I bought if for fossils from people who didn’t care about them.  I wanted to create jobs for local people and have a nifty store where people could buy fossils to put on their bookshelves.”

“Professor Cal Lewis is your boy.”

“Go ahead and call him.”

He did so, but when he made a connection, very little was said, and Dave understood none of it; not surprising, because they were speaking Apache.  They hung up.

Robbie led Dave to the top of the hill up the bank.  It was not hard climbing.  On the way they saw nothing in the way of fossils.  The walked around the edge of the hill and captured the waypoints.  A mathematician would have called it a line integral, sort of. The integral is the length of the line.  They had their raw data by the time Cal came.

On the desert floor, the strata ran at a slight angle.  As you went up, that was no longer true.  Cal sketched it for Dave.  The layers were taller on one side.

“Cal, how would the layers be sloped like this?”

Cal said, “Some kind of shift like an up thrust due probably to plate movement.  All it means, Dave, is that we can’t simply measure altitude and know the age of a layer just like that.  We need to see what is in a layer and do the age by that.  Let’s go look at this one you just found.”

They went up the hill, Cal, being the oldest, should have been slow, but he was not.  They got to the fossil easily.  Cal named it.  “I’m almost sure of it, but if we can get the bones out, we will know.  Let’s take a GPS on this spot, and put a little junk over it so it’s not too easy to spot.”

They did it, and went back down.  It was getting cold and windy, so they made a circle with the ten wheeler, Cal photographing out the window.  Dave filled the 10 wheeler with some 1x1/2 rock, and they went to the house.  

They sat in the little library.  Cal had brought some brandy, so they had a bit of that.  

Dave started.  “Do you want to dig it?”

“Yes.  It’s an ancient bird.  Not a lot exist.  I will ask you for limited permission.  Just for this one fossil.  And if we come into something else, we will see what you want to do.  We’re used to keeping a dig secret.  If people know where it is, look for the basic opportunist to come, make a mess, steal a few things, and leave you with much less scientific material.”

“I’m worried about that sort, and also government hassles.  We want to sell trilobites and stuff, and Robbie thinks I should retain title to the big ones and loan them to museums so we don’t pay to insure them, and so people get to see them.  We have Apache, too, who should get some of the middle nice ones.  I’ll let you have the bird, if you remember, it’s my land, but I have lots of people who are to benefit.”

“I can get a little money out of the university to pay local help.  Mostly it’s grad students, but we can get a little local labor.”

“Let me call someone, Cal.”

He called Carol.  Could she get over to the store and meet some people?  Yes, her Dad was here.  Yes, he would bring her.

“This is one of the girls from the Catholic school.  Wants to be a paleontologist.”

“As every right thinking person does.”

They laughed.  Dave showed Cal the crab.

“You could wholesale it for $200-$300.  There are lots of these.  It’s much more recent than the altitude you have it from, so it’s a wash down.”

They tried to map out the layers, but aside from the fish and the bird, it was uncertain.  They paged through the pictures on the computer, and ended up sketching in the best guesses.  Cal and Robbie did not expect anything good in the hard top layer, and they decided to walk it while it was clear, and if they didn’t see anything, they would rip a little and look.  If they found nothing, they would do it again.

Candellaria answered the door and brought Carol and her father in.  They went to the library and unfolded two folding chairs.

“I’m Mitch, Carol’s dad.”

“I’m Dave, this is Robbie, and Cal, the paleontologist.”

Everyone shook hands.  

Dave addressed Mitch.  “What sort of work do you do, Mitch?”

“Nothing right now.   Mostly driving trucks when there is work.”

“Can you drive a loader?”

“Not expertly, but putting dirt in the truck, I could do.”

“We have part time with the ten wheeler, if you’re interested.”

“Yeah.  Something else, too.  Carol wants the crab.  I don’t have the money now, but if we could work something out…”

“Carol, you can have the crab, and I want one thing for it.  Don’t you or Mitch tell anyone it came from here.  Nobody is likely to poach here if they think all we are finding is trilobites.  And using heavy equipment to do that.  Rock hounds  trespass sometimes but when they can get a pickup full without having to sneak around, well, it’s not really worth it.  That would all change, though if they knew valuable stuff is being found.”

“I understand, Dave.”

“Now the other thing, you are on break, now?”

“Yes.  For about a month.”

“Mitch, see if this sounds all right for you, too.  I could contact your headmistress, and see if we could put you on independent studies for your last semester.  What do you need to graduate?”

“One more English class, writing.  Foreign language.   History.  She looks at where a student is headed, and adjusts.”

“Spanish for a foreign language?”

“They like that.”

“Who here does not speak Spanish?”

“Nobody.  Who here has written a college textbook in Spanish, published.”

Robbie and Cal raised their hands.

  “What do you think if I call the lady with the big ruler and see if we can give you a part time job, and write papers for your graduation requirements?”

“I would like that, Dave.”

Dave called.  “Ma’am, may I put you on speaker?”

“I am here with Robbie, Carol, her dad, Mitch, and please don’t mention this name to others, Professor Cal Lewis, a paleontologist.  I would like your thoughts on an independent study for Carol for next semester.”

“What would she study?”

“She says she needs foreign language, we have two authors of published textbooks in Spanish.  Then she needs writing and history.  So I am thinking of papers on the military history of the gulf war with a Marine major general for advisor, and then others on paleontology, physical anthropology and geology.  That should be a lot of writing.”

“Carol, these guys are going to expect college level work.  I’ll ask you if you really want to do it after I ask how many pages of double space they are going to expect.”

Dave said,” I think 20 pages would be good for the history.  Or if you waive the history, which she will have to do in college anyway, and the foreign language, which she can learn from half the people in New Mexico, then I would suggest 80+.  Starting with plate tectonics, the formation of sedimentary rock, the principles of fossilization, an overview of human prehistory, the fossil record, lab work, and actual work in the field with Cal.  She would be expected to submit photographs on disc of the dig, explain how the work is done, and diagram the layers she works on with some software we all have.  Nobody else’s words will appear in her paper except in quotes with proper footnotes.  When she interviews her experts, she will record the interviews to disc.”

“This sounds like a pretty ambitious project.”

Cal said, “Paleontology is not for slackers.  Lots of people think it sounds neat until they camp out on a dig with nobody but the bugs, scorpions and snakes to keep them company.”

Dave said, “If you let people off easy in training, those are the ones you bring home in a box.  That yelling in people’s faces and scrubbing the floor with tooth brushes is for people who don’t know how to train.  You yell when they do something right, or when you’re telling them ‘you can do it’.  You get people to train hard, and then they show up at the J.C. and the spoiled brats watch her run past them like Carl Lewis.”

“Carol, are you ready for these guys?  They are going to put you through the Marine Basic of paleontology.”

“Yes, Ma’am.”

“I will approve the plan with no history or foreign language.  You can read history any time, and I’m sure you will.  I’ll ask the guys to throw a little Spanish at her.  Tell her ‘dig here’ and say it in Spanish, too.  Carol, submit a plan of 2-3 pages or so, and we’ll put you on it.  Sister Sarah and I will expect something every 3 weeks or so, showing your work to date.”

“Thank you, Ma’am.”

“Thank the guys who are doing this for you.  Bye.”

They hung up.

“Mitch, you want to do a driving test and all?”

“Sure.  Is Carol going to have to just wait?”

“No.  We’re going to detail her on the paper.  We might show her the drawing program, some of what we are thinking on that hill.”

“What are you going to do with the hill?”

“Take it down to the desert floor.  Sell the junk for driveway rocks, sell the nice rocks to rock hounds, of course sell the fossils.  Remember this is top secret: Cal is going to dig one nice one we have already found.  Carol is lined out for a low paying hard work job on that dig.”

“So what do I need to do?”

Dave pulled out his palmtop.  “Put your driver’s license on the screen, and your thumb on that thing there and press enter.”

He did.  “What is that for?”

“This house, and the quarry are a security perimeter.  Trucks come and go to the piles when we’re open, but people in the building with five sides want to know who you are if you work here.”

“Why would they anyway?”

“This place is a potential target of foreign intelligence.  It’s very unlikely that anyone will try anything here.  It would be a real bad place to try a crime.  We don’t call 911.  We have much better numbers on speed dial.  The girls are safer here than at home.”

“All right.  We’ll do the study for Carol and driving for me if you accept me, but if there is some kind of problem, you have to get her out of the way.”

“Goes without saying, but it won’t happen anyway.”

“What do we do next?”

Dave went to the door.  “Candellaria?”

“What’s up?”

“Can you take Mitch on a driving test?”

“Yeah.”

“Also, show him the loaders, see how he looks on those, and the sorter if he’s doing well.”

“Come with me, Mitch.” She said.  They went out and took the ten wheeler out to the rise, and she had him load it.  They got in the truck and went over to the quarry.

Dave, Cal and Robbie worked out the details of the paper’s outline with Carol.  Dave gave her one of those blank bound books, and had her start numbering the pages about ten leaves in.  He had her reserve the first few for ‘summary of contents’ and then ‘contents’ and list the page numbers on the ones after that.  She put in titles like ‘general geology’ and ‘fossil formation’ and so on.  The guys gave her the information for the outline, and Dave invited her to use the computer in the guest room to start on her proposal.  Robbie showed her how to wrap the crab, plastic bag, bubble wrap, and put it in a cardboard box and fold the top in a circular half lap pattern.  “We tend to save anything like bubble wrap and soft foam things used to pack printers and such.  You take wine in a box to a dig, and people will put stuff in the box, and blow up the bladder by mouth, and you have a pretty good shock absorber on one side, anyway.”

Dave took her to the guest room, and gave her a file to look at.  “This is a proposal for a special major.  The guy who proposed it struggled with a university faculty to be allowed to major in electronics, chemistry and physics.  Today he is designing instruments for hostile environments like high temperatures, corrosive chemicals, stuff like that.”

“So I should copy this, or?”

“Look at how it is formatted and laid out.  Show the basic relationship that makes this thesis worth doing.  Geology is applied physics and chemistry.  That is how the fossil record was created.  Then you apply mapping, digging, photographing, and so on, and you see what you found.  Then you do paleontology, and at the recent end of that, you have the rise of man, and physical anthropology.  It is a single amazing story, and you want to tell it instead of sitting in a high school classroom with a lot of bored girls who just want to have their 2.2 kids and live in the suburbs.”

“I don’t say that, though.”

“No.  It shows through in the way you focus on the science.  You can have your 2.2 kids and live in the suburbs if you like, but the focus here is this fascinating story you have to tell.”

He left her to her work and returned to the library.  Cal had decided that the top layer was not going to have any fossils.  He had called in, and been told that he could have stipends for two graduate students and Carol.  Cal and Robbie wanted Dave to rip a little and see if they were right.  They headed up to the quarry.

* * *

Mitch drove the ten wheeler with an easy but careful style.  He took it to the quarry and dumped his load near the sorter on the pile Candellaria had selected.  “We have lots of categories of rock.  This is off the rise, and we will sort it to sizes rock hounds use.  Then we put it in piles over by the lapidary shop, and they pick what they want, and throw  the stuff they think is no good into the little loader or just on the driveway.  Pull around to that pile there, and park to load.  Load us with that stuff.  That is graded rock from the rise.  Take your time.  I know you are not used to that loader.  Careful is good.  Safety really is first here.”

Mitch loaded the truck and parked the loader, leaving the cab locked and returning the key.

“Next thing you do, Mitch?”

“Clear loose rocks from bumpers and such.”

He went out and did it.

“Good.  That is a big thing to Dave.  At A&D, if you have one of those signs that say ‘not responsible for loose rocks’ they won’t load you.  If you don’t sweep your truck, they will tell you not to come back.  He has some gruesome pictures of people who were killed by flying rocks, a