Things of Beauty

So far, no one has asked me why I collect this stuff (and why our garage is filled with rocks waiting to be polished - or disposed of). Hard to explain really, but let me put it this way. I find the abstract patterns and designs in nature to be stunningly beautiful. It has been argued that nature is ultimately the inspiration for all art; certainly I find the variety of color and design I find on the beach to be as lovely as anything I have ever seen.

This rock, for example, with its subtle shades of color and striking web of black lines, is not so far from classic abstract expressionist art. In fact, I might take up a brush and try painting something like this.  Until then, however, I am content - delighted, in fact - that such beauty exists in so prosaic a setting as the cobble beach below my house.

Washington State Gemstone

I didn't know until recently that petrified wood is Washington State's official gemstone.  It makes sense: we have some wonderful sites for petrified wood around the state, most notably at Ginkgo Petrified Forest State Park above the Columbia River near Vantage. There are many other sites as well, many accessible to the rockhound - and some, memorably, in people's back yards.

But to my knowledge, all of the best sites are scattered around Eastern Washington, many associated with lava flows and ash deposits from Washington's long volcanic history. There are far fewer really good sites on the western side of the Cascades. But for months I have found chunks of this black and brown petrified wood among beach cobbles here in Seattle (See August 25 post). I have found enough of them in fact, of very similar color and composition, that I can only think they are from a single source - somewhere north of here. (But as I have said many times, the glaciers that carved this area could have brought them from hundreds of miles away)

Still, it's always a treat to find them, though in their rough, surf-tumbled state, they are not always easy to recognize...

Home from the East

Opercula

I'm home from Sulawesi, but without any rocks. Most of my time there I was on the coast where everything is limestone and coral rubble. No chance of interesting minerals there. But although I came home without any rocks (and with lighter luggage than usual) I did stumble onto one interesting collectible - the "cat's eye"operculum.  These are the hard "doors" to some species of turban snails and they were common along the shoreline. They are graceful little things and - of course - I brought some home. Probably too soft to polish with stones, but I'll experiment.

Heading East - the FAR East...

Black jasper/agate, Puget Sound

I thought I would post one more local stone (from a Puget Sound beach) before I leave this weekend for Indonesia. It is a highly fractured, but rather lovely, agate-like piece, semi-transparent and hard.

My destination is the island of Sulawesi, and my mission is to document the life history of a unique bird that lives there - the Maleo.  But in the little reading I have done on the island, I have learned that it also has a complex geology including a mix-up of volcanics, and both ocean floor and continental  rocks.

I have no idea whether I'm likely to find any collectible rocks, but as always, I will keep an eye out... Back in a couple weeks.