For this first finds assignment, I created a picture of myself as a nostalgic, home town girl, who is very much connected to school and academic work. My finds center around ways in which my memories connect to my academic work. Although there are not many images that make this connection explicit, the juxtaposition of personal images from the past and present show a focus both on history and on academic work.
St. Mary's Lyceum
When I was thirteen until I was fifteen I set duck pins at the St. Mary's Lyceum on Friday and Saturday nights. First I set for the women on Fridays, and then, because I had was fast setting and jumping out of the way, I got to set for the men on Saturday nights. The patrons of the duck bowling lanes were mostly older residents of Sharpsburg and members of St. Mary's Catholic Church. When I was working, I got to talk to my friends who were setting in other lanes beside me, but I think there were two major reasons this job sticks out in my mind. The first is that I was the first female pin setter for the men bowlers. This may not seem like much, but when working for people who lived in an era where women were the weaker sex, the fact that I earned the respect of these men and women meant a lot to me at a young age. The second reason is that duck bowling is an older sport and many of the bowlers were older Italian people. They reminded me of my family, my Nana, Grandmother, and Great Aunts and Uncles. I can smell the oil on the lanes mixing with the pipe tobacco that they smuggled past the refreshment lady in their weekly "rebel without a cause" routine. Watching these people reclaim their youth, and seeing the wives come in and collect their husbands on Saturday nights allowed me a glimpse into a past I was physcially connected to but was , at the same time, mentally ignoratnt of.