Classification
May. 22nd, 2007 03:00 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
stoutfellowI'm not sure what brought this memory to mind, but it amused me to remember it.
Background: it will probably come as no surprise that, as a child, I was fascinated by taxonomy. One of our sets of encyclopedias - World Book, I think - had detailed and illustrated lists of phyla, orders, families and genera, and I spent many happy hours poring over those pages.
Now, since my father was in the Army, my childhood was a peripatetic one, as he was transferred from base to base. When I was about eight, we spent a year at Fort Huachuca in Arizona. We lived at the top of a little hill - or perhaps it was the rim of a small valley; there was a footpath that led downward, at any rate, and at the bottom of the path was a small wildlife reserve. (In hindsight, it probably was more like a tiny zoo than a reserve, but whatever.) I don't recall what-all was there, but I do remember the donkey (relax, C, I won't tell that story!), various birds, and a javelina. We kids frequently trooped down there to look around.
There was a small office building adjacent to the reserve, and for some reason we occasionally went in there as well. In that building was a file cabinet, and on that cabinet was a sign declaring that "this cabinet does not contain classified material".
I can't tell you for how long I labored under the belief that that cabinet contained animal and plant specimens whose nature had not yet been determined. The phrasing seemed odd, but as an Army brat I was used to that...
Background: it will probably come as no surprise that, as a child, I was fascinated by taxonomy. One of our sets of encyclopedias - World Book, I think - had detailed and illustrated lists of phyla, orders, families and genera, and I spent many happy hours poring over those pages.
Now, since my father was in the Army, my childhood was a peripatetic one, as he was transferred from base to base. When I was about eight, we spent a year at Fort Huachuca in Arizona. We lived at the top of a little hill - or perhaps it was the rim of a small valley; there was a footpath that led downward, at any rate, and at the bottom of the path was a small wildlife reserve. (In hindsight, it probably was more like a tiny zoo than a reserve, but whatever.) I don't recall what-all was there, but I do remember the donkey (relax, C, I won't tell that story!), various birds, and a javelina. We kids frequently trooped down there to look around.
There was a small office building adjacent to the reserve, and for some reason we occasionally went in there as well. In that building was a file cabinet, and on that cabinet was a sign declaring that "this cabinet does not contain classified material".
I can't tell you for how long I labored under the belief that that cabinet contained animal and plant specimens whose nature had not yet been determined. The phrasing seemed odd, but as an Army brat I was used to that...
