It’s not lions and tigers and bears, but reptiles
and water and mud, Oh My! One of my
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| Old tree and blue sky |
memories from the 1950s is traveling to the
Paluxy River to see the dinosaur tracks. I thought that the tracks were made
the day before and was rather disappointed when I was told that they were trace
fossils; I wouldn’t see any actual dinosaurs lurking in the woods. We clambered
down the side of the river and stared into the muddy water to see holes in
rocks. My other disappointment was that there had been lots of rain and the
water was too deep for me to sit in the tracks. I was underwhelmed. I’m fairly
sure that I hadn’t been back to Glen Rose until this last visit. This time,
although there had been rain, the water was clear and the tracks were visible,
plus it was a warm day with a bright, blue, Texas sky – it was worth the drive!
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| Dawn over New York City |
The first time I actually went to New York, other than to
work from morning to night, or to buzz through the airport, was in 2012. Dave
took me to upstate New York for our
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| Entrance to AMNH |
anniversary and then down into Manhattan. I
loved it all and was anxious to see everything. We had planned to visit the
American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) and the Museum
of Modern Art (MoMA). I completely underestimated the size of these two
treasure troves thinking we could see them both in one day. So since outrunning
the hurricane gave us an extra day to explore New York City, we decided to
spend it at the AMNH; I was delighted. The American
Museum of Natural History is one of the largest museums in the world. It is
just across the street from Central Park and has 27 interconnected buildings with
45 permanent exhibition halls, in addition to a planetarium and a library. Given
that we had an entire day, we still couldn’t see even the small portion of the 32
million specimens of plants, humans, animals, fossils, minerals, rocks,
meteorites, and cultural artifacts that are on exhibit. We did see one of the
founders, however; Teddy Roosevelt not only sits astride his horse to welcome
guests as you enter, but there is a statue of him on a bench in one of the
rotundas. I was also glad to see the T. rex and the cheeky monkey from Night at the Museum were still
in residence, as well. Housed in the oldest part of the museum was a collection
of Northwest Coast Indians artifacts; this portion of the museum was begun in
1874, with the Victorian Gothic building opening in 1877. Most of the rest of
the museum exterior is in rusticated brownstone neo-Romanesque, except for the
entry which is an over-the-top Beaux-Arts monument. The entry hall is a vast
Roman basilica design that echoes with the excited voices of children and
adults.
