Ghost of Christmas Presents

My first love in science, the first thing that really interested me intellectually, was astronomy. It was early 1986, around the time I turned five. (I was a weird kid.) Anyway, I was really into Star Wars, and wanted to go to space and explore different planets. I had (and still have) a book, "Astronomy Today", with lots of great illustrations and diagrams; sure, I wasn't *reading it* reading it yet, but I got a lot out of those illustrations. Then I discovered that, contrary to the movies, we couldn't exceed the speed of light, so we were basically stuck here. It's a nice enough solar system, but, well, y'know... the realization was terribly disappointing, and space went from an obsession to a pleasant side interest (I still love going to the planetary science sessions when attending GSA annual meetings).

At the time, we had just moved to Tucson. There's a lot of difference geologically between southern Arizona and south-central Minnesota; for starters, a lot more of the geology is right there at the surface in Arizona, and a lot more of it is Mesozoic. Still, Arizona is not Dinosaur Central; it's more like a nice suburb. After nearly 40 years I can't say what it was about dinosaurs that caught my eye. Maybe it was the British Museum toys at the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum. Whatever it was, the feedback loop started: kid shows interest, people around start feeding the interest, interest intensifies...

The step that sealed the interest in paleontology came at Christmas 1986. There was one rectangular gift with unusual heft. Under the wrapping paper was the Normanpedia, "The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Dinosaurs". Could I read it? Well, okay, sure, I was a great reader for five-and-a-half, but it's safe to assume it took some time and practice before I was conversant (and the book probably accelerated the process, so on top of his scientific accolades, David Norman can take some credit for improving at least one kid's  literacy). But don't forget the second word of the title! The restorations, the photos, the skeletal diagrams! I went through reams of paper tracing skeletons, then drawing outlines around them on the other side of the sheets. That way, there would be a skeleton on one side, a drawing on the other, and if I held the paper to the light, both of them would be there, skeleton revealed inside the body. I loved that book to death; it's in a box of mementos somewhere at home, dust jacket long gone, spine held together by heavy-duty tape, a slip of paper taped over the "dinosauroid" drawing because it creeped me out. I had to get a second copy in the Nineties because the first was falling apart. The second copy also started falling apart after about ten years, so now I'm on my third. Anyway, no particular moral or commentary or insight this time, just wanted to share some holiday nostalgia. See you in 2026!