Stewards monitoring site on the Santa Fe National Forest (Credit: Santa Fe National Forest)
Time traveling is one of my favorite things to do as a citizen scientist. As part of the New Mexico Site Steward Program, I walk slowly through an archeological site, the ground littered with the remains of pottery from people who lived here a thousand years ago. I am free to touch and finger these clay shards as long as I carefully put them back where I found them. I pick up (and put down) a square of white with thin black lines, part of a bowl with an interior painted scene—perhaps a crane spearing fish or a woman giving birth. I pick up (and put down) a curved piece the size of my palm of brown corrugated cooking ware--all those simmering stews of meat, roots, and herbs. I pick up (and put down) a geometric ...
