It's Not Every Day You Get To See A Cross Section of a Rectum!

Jordan is done with his first year of grad school! Huzzah! I immediately took advantage of this by arranging a super packed weekend full of fun activities for which he would have no excuse not to participate. There was eating out, swanky nightclubs, cheese tasting, Philadelphia, and movie watching, all supposed to be enjoyed while praising the amazing wife who arranges such activities. As it turns out we are too poor for the cheese tasting and getting too old for swanky nightclubs. It was also humid (which makes us grumpy) and rainy (which interfered with my wardrobe choices and picnic blanket). A revision of my wonderful plans was made and we decided to go to the Mutter Museum in Philadelphia. Good choice.





The museum is full of strange little medical oddities and paraphernalia. Some of my favorites include the collection of skulls (there was a whole separate section devoted to skulls of syphilis victims, that stuff will mess you up!), the collection of ear bones, and shrunken heads. Everywhere you looked there were cross sections of skin (or faces!) suspended in a tank of stained liquid. There was also a fascinating display about the assassination of President Lincoln and the capture and death of John Wilkes Booth. I learned about wet and dry specimens, and saw a decent amount of bones, skeletons and shriveled organs. Some of the items on display, while I’m sure important to the study of medicine, made me sad. For example, I had to stop looking at the progression of fetuses, especially the ones with deformities. Surprisingly, all of the other patrons were well behaved, except for this one group of college age guys being really loud and disrespectful.

Part of the cozy charm of the museum is the display. Everything feels old fashioned because most of it is, and the newer parts didn’t always seem to fit in with the old dark wood and yellowing placards. Even though it was hard to read an aging handwritten label through a display of rippled old glass it lent an air of nostalgia to the experience. One could spend hours examining the two floors of the small museum and we did. (As a side note, don’t wear a dress or skirt, because the people on the bottom level can totally look up and examine something else.) We left feeling excited that we had learned something; their slogan "disturbingly informative" is accurate.

All in all it was the perfect trip for a rainy afternoon.