You remind me of high school. Every summer, our 11th grade teachers got together and invented a society and made artifacts, which they carefully buried in the forest next to our school. In September, students began excavating the site, mapping it, recovering artifacts, and piecing the society together. Since all of our teachers were involved in the project, our geography, mapping, documentation, math, history, language, art, culture skills etc. were put to the test.

Knowing this society was completely made-up, challenged everything we thought we knew. Making assumptions and jumping to conclusions was certain failure. The discovery of a new artifact could completely unravel conclusions we’d been certain of for weeks.

At the end of the semester, each team presented the society they’d pieced together. No two teams arrived at the same conclusion. When our teachers presented the society they’d invented, so many light bulbs went off in our minds, we could have lit a city.

40 years later, I am still trying to piece the society I live in together.

PS. . . that’s the long way of saying, I enjoyed your article a lot.