I'm at Archaeology Camp!

I am holed up in a hogan dwelling, hiding from a fierce lightning storm with someone who just told me five stories about almost being hit by lightning. The lightning is passing right overhead and we yelp and jump each time the thunder roars through and shakes our little structure..."we" is Ashley (nickname: Lightning Rod), an English teacher who told her lightning stories with a cute North Carolina accent, Jan, an art teacher who could tell them with an even cuter Tennessee accent, and me.

I am at the equivalent of adult summer camp, at a National Endowment for the Humanities summer institute in Cortez, Colorado (near the four corners in the SW)-

This is the point at which Karen, one of the program staff, dressed in serious rain gear, knocked frantically on our hogan door and told us to "take cover in the main building - downstairs." A tornado had been spotted close by, and winds were expected up to 65 mph.

So - in case you read over my first paragraph, thinking that perhaps I was exaggerating - I wasn't. Yep, that is what we did on our second night at archaeology camp - we ran up a path through lightning and thunder and took refuge in the basement of the lodge, playing card games until the all-call was made for our return to safety. Ironic..."Zero" precipitaion to date this year read the weather report the other day, but it has rained each of the three days I've been here. A rainy summer for this Seattleite, anywhere she takes herself...

Now I am back in the hogan (pronounced "ho-gone"), which is similar to a yurt, where deer, jack rabbits, owls and prairie dogs (and perhaps a mountain lion) will greet me when I wake up tomorrow (or when I have to walk from the hogan to the bathroom in a few hours), as we board the bus to see Mesa Verde on our first field trip. Some "people in high authority" have ruined the word "awesome" for me, but this program, "Bridging Cultures: Diversity and Unity in the Pueblo World" is just pretty awesome. Twenty five teachers are here from all over the US (I'm the only one from the NW) as well as 25 high school students who are attending their own camp. You'll have to wait to hear what else these NEH wizards have planned for us. Oh, and there are two other "Margies" here. Three of us. That has never happened to me before~