Page 24 - Tạp chí bonsai cây cảnh BCI 2015Q2

Tiny

Giants

The Beauty of

Small Stones

Text and Photos by Sam Edge, USA

t was a warm and carefree summer day. You notice. I marveled at the beauty of this creation and
know, one of those days when the temperature my fortune at having been at the right place at the
is at a perfect 72 degrees, with big white fluffy right time.
clouds, and you hear water tumbling off the Collecting often goes hand-in-hand with a growing
Istones as it meanders downstream. Then some- passion for knowledge. It can be the source of creative
thing catches your eyes. There it is, sitting amongst expression. We enjoy the social camaraderie and ex-
hundreds of other stones but for some reason it seizes citement when engaged in the stone hunt or just the
your full attention. Perhaps it is the shape, the color, simple pleasure of sharing our collection with those
or the size—or in that perfect moment, all three. You who have a mutual love of what we collect.
bend down to gingerly pick it up with both hands, As humans, we love to collect things! There is an
turning it 360 degrees while simultaneously exhaling excellent article by Stacey Baker and James Gentry
your breath and quietly saying to yourself, “This one entitled Kids as Collectors: A Phenomenological Study
is going home with me!” of First and Fifth Graders. In their paper, they inter-
It is my hope at this point in the story we are sharing viewed 79 children, 72 of whom had a collection of
very similar memories. My experience was at around one kind or another. Many of them started their col-
seven years old. It was the “perfect” stone—beautifully lection with small stones. It is certainly how I started
round, smooth to the touch as an old worn out coin, collecting so many years ago.
and the color, black as only black can be on a moon- My very first stone was actually quite small.
less night. A collector’s passion was started that day Certainly small enough to go into a seven-year-old’s
but whose real fulfillment came some 50 years later pants pocket. The smallness was attractive because it
when I discovered that adults really do collect stones! was easy to hold in my hands. The hands are often
I remember taking that first stone home and proudly associated with intimacy. Holding and feeling that
showing it to anyone who was interested. At night it beautiful stone in the solitude of being alone in my
was safely placed on my small, somewhat decrepit, room reinforced the intimacy of quietly studying this
nightstand where I could reach out to make sure it centuries-old creation. Where did it come from, what
was still there. That first stone accompanied me ev- was it made of, how did it get such a glow, or what I
erywhere, tightly tucked away in my Levi blue jean’s now know as patina? It was the beginning of a love
front pocket where it could be retrieved at a moment’s for understanding and appreciating this ancient art

22 | BCI | April/May/June 2015