Every year, about this time, I try to make a trip to California to see my parents who live in Cambria. For those of you who do not know, Cambria is on the coast about half way between San Francisco and Los Angeles. It has a rocky shoreline that is known for it’s “moonstones” which are actually ocean washed pieces of quartz. The whole beach is crazy with agates and jade as well as jasper and smooth chunks of sandstone and occasional bits of sea glass.
My parents are both rock people. My mother is a geologist with a mind like a trap and a keen eye for spotting the unusual amid the piles of ordinary. She has collected lovely and odd rocks her whole life. Her favorites will always be those with at least one perfect quartz ring around them. She wears one around her neck that her father had mounted for her when she was a child. Even he knew her love of rocks was innate. My father is a geophysicists; a MARINE one to be specific. How rocks form is more his business, but he compliments my mother well when they are out and about staring at the ground and poking things with their toes.
The weather this trip was ideal. I drove the 700 miles there with my eldest daughter, Dsay and my aged Golden Retriever, Amelia. There has been a lot of smoke in the air from regional forest fires but the air in Cambria was clear, for the most part. In between spending time visiting, we went to the beach to collect what we could, allegedly for the new rock tumbler my husband had given me for our recent anniversary. Instead, i mostly collected rocks that are just perfect the way they are.
These are a variety of stones, from granite to jasper with some shell and sandstone as well. My thought is to arrange them into necklaces with perhaps a more interesting stone as the focal point, perhaps not. It’s hard to decide. They feel good between the fingers; cool and smooth; very calming.
While we were there, we also visited my favorite antique shop in Cambria. They have a wonderful collection of stone beads as well as stone specimens and ore samples. These beads I brought back as well. Maybe I will incorporate them into my stone necklace idea, maybe I wont. First, I need to unpack the boxes and boxes of stone specimens that my parents gave me from their own collection. I hope to share a few of those with you soon as well. Big things are coming! I can feel it.
