This month, the Nelson Ladies Auxiliary met in downtown St. Paul.  We went to the Human Body exhibit at the Science Museum, followed by lunch at the St. Paul Hotel. 


The exhibit was really interesting.  At first, it felt like any exhibit.  Bones on display, little cards with descriptions of what I was seeing.  But the further I got into the exhibit, the more fascinating it became, and all the more real.  I kept thinking about the process that would allow bodies to be preserved in a permanent and viewable state.  The beautiful combination of art and science that was visible in the way that the bodies were positioned.   The painstaking effort it must take to reassemble something as complex as a cardiovascular system with nothing else to support it.  The decision that each of those people had to make to donate their bodies to an exhibit.  Especially the displays that included children, tiny unborn people, and a pregnant woman.  For some reason, it was easy for me to think of the rest as old people who were just ready to go, but the kids and pregnant woman felt very real and close to home. 

All around me I could hear discussions like "This is what Grandma's knee looks like, remember when she had her surgery last year?"  I could hear people relating their own lives to the displays they were viewing.  We had some discussions of our own - "This is what Marty's hip looks like" and "Look at how big this heart was, that must have been why Grandma Harriette had such a tough time breathing" and "Look at these diseased livers, this is what all of ours look like.  Now let's go have a drink."

So we did.  We walked a few blocks in the cool fall air and had a delicious lunch.  On the agenda at this meeting:
- Who's no longer dating who, who's still dating, who is newly dating...and how it's all going
- New pants, jackets and shoes and where were they purchased
- Preliminary discussions regarding Thanksgiving
- Next meeting: spa day