I think bones are such a great metaphor. And more than that, they actually are the way that we learn about the past in the most straightforward manner. 

So whether it’s that we’re finding the bones of people from the past in graveyards or we’re learning about who is actually in Potter’s field on Hart Island or what Neanderthals were doing or early prototypes of homo sapiens, all of theses bones are a very direct path to finding wisdom. That’s how I see it. 

Bones also have the skull and crossbones insignias, the pirate flag, the poison sign. Where all the secrets lurk. The things that no one wants to see. The bones that no one can identify. Which is definitely a recurring theme in my own life, in history in general and definitely in American history in particular. 

You know, whose bones do we care about and whose bones do we abandon? That’s definitely very much on my mind. So I think that’s a big part of it.

And there’s also humor in it to me. Just the whole idea of Old Bones Odyssey, it sounds like a jiggling skeleton doing a dance or like the Scarecrow in The Wizard of Oz. Something about it makes me smile.