Volcanista is hosting July’s Accretionary Wedge on what inspired one to become a geologist. For me, the reason is simple, if somewhat convoluted. I became a geologist because I can’t sing.
Back when I was in high school, my school, a ‘bog-standard’ comprehensive, reckoned it had a really good school choir. It didn’t, of course, but the important part to this story is that it thought it had. One day, the whole of my year were lined up in the school’s assembly hall and told to sing hymns. Teachers walked up and down the rows of us pupils listening to the ‘singing’. If they thought you had a modicum of singling ability they would tap you on the shoulder and you were in the choir – no arguments. As anyone who knows me well will testify, I can’t sing for toffee. My better half (who can sing very well) bans me from even trying to sing along to the radio in the car. It was no surprise then, that my shoulder remained untapped, I was barred from the school choir, and the rest, as they say, is history.
Those of us who were choristercally challenged then had to be given things to keep us occupied during the two-hour a week choir practice sessions. We were given a variety of things in six week blocks, I can remember model making, drama, and gaming – and then there was an introduction to rocks and geology. I found it moderately interesting, but I can’t say I was blown away by it at the time.
Later on, I reached the point at which I had to choose the subjects I studied for GCE ‘O-level’. Some choices were straight forward, e.g. Maths, English, Physics, Chemistry, Geography. I didn’t like biology, I was squeamish about dissections, so I didn’t choose that. For languages I chose French and German, the latter being a big regret and in hindsight I should have done Spanish as it would have been much more useful to me.
There was then one subject I had left to choose from a list of less common subjects. The one I wanted to do was Technical Drawing. This was largely because my father was an engineering draughtsman. When I handed my selection form in, my teacher told me that I should probably choose something else as, as well as being useless at singing, I was rubbish at art. While this is true I do think that technical drawing is a different skill and I like to think that I was/am reasonably good at it. It certainly helped later on with geological map making as an undergraduate and producing diagrams for my Ph.D. thesis in the pre-Corel Draw days. Anyway, I took my teacher’s advice and looked for another topic. Geology was on the list, and having done a bit of it instead of choir practice, I chose to do that.
I got on reasonably well with geology. I had my first geology field course to the Isle of Wight. However, it was combined with geography and I’m still mentally scarred from having to do Human Geography questionnaires.
Whilst geology ‘O-level’ was interesting, my main interest at this stage was Physics. After high school I went to my home-town’s sixth-form college and again was faced with choosing subjects to study, this time for GCE ‘A-level’. Again, a couple of subjects were straight forward choices – Maths and Physics. The big dilemma was between Chemistry and Geology. I had probably enjoyed chemistry as much as geology at O-level. My chemistry teacher was a pyromaniac and most lessons seemed to involve explosions. Whilst this had been fun for a teenage lad, I didn’t feel I’d actually learned that much and I was starting to struggle a bit with some of it. So, after much heart searching, I chose Geology, and it was one of the best decisions that I have ever made.
At sixth-form induction I was asked if I wanted to do four A-levels. Great, I thought, I can do both geology and chemistry. Unfortunately, what they had in mind was to do two Maths A-levels. So I ended up doing Pure Maths, Applied Maths, Physics and Geology. In Maths, it was the hardest I have ever worked. I was studying with some seriously bright people and it was really hard to keep up. Physics was hugely enjoyable and if it wasn’t for geology I would have probably become a physicist.
However, geology was truly inspirational. This was due to two reasons. First and foremost, was that we had a superb and inspiring teacher in Fran Stratton who really brought the subject alive. She even put on additional classes for some of us so we could take the more advanced ‘S-level’ as well A-level. Second, was the group of my fellow students. We were only a small cohort of nine students (three of us called Ian) and we got on very well. We were allowed to hang out in the geology laboratory at lunch times. We honed our rock identification skills by selecting a sample from the drawers at random, tossing them across the room to colleague (including an asbestos sample I remember) and asking them to identify it. I also spent many hours in the school’s geological map library, learning to read them and draw cross sections. Geological maps still fascinate me today. I had my first proper field course – to Derbyshire which also included my first (underage) pint of beer. I was hooked (on both).
So, my allegiances switched from physics to geology. When choosing a degree course to study I went for geology, but a course where I could specialise in geophysics, bringing the two threads together. Although I now teach geophysics at university, I still regard myself much more of a geologist than a physicist.
And all because I can’t sing.
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