Weathering By Laci Hoyt I found a stone the other day. It was lying in the freshly greened grass along the stone walkway to our front door. The stone was flat, roughly the size of a silver half dollar, characteristics that distinguished it from the thousands of one-fourth-inch pebbles filling the walkway. The thing that drew me in, though, was the rippled-looking surface, dark grey, wetlooking but not wet. I bent down and looked closer. I took my pointer finger and stroked the surface before I pinched the sides between my thumb and pointer and brought it closer to my face. The surface felt like weathered sandstone. The edges formed a rough and wide heart shape. I set it on the palm of my left hand and stroked the surface again, some childlike sense of wonder settling into my tissue. I felt myself smile. I brought the rock inside and washed it off in the kitchen sink. The weight of it is different than I expect it to be, as is the feel, and for reasons I cannot explain, this stone is now precious to me. I love small delights like this. Things like bubbles spontaneously erupting on the surface of an asphalted country road or the tiny flowers that grow in the grass between mows. All those easily overlooked bits of magic that are present every day if only we look. *** My teenage son went dance-skating across the kitchen floor recently in a moment of pure childlike fun. He is so often serious these days, but at this moment he was just himself, unfiltered and unrestrained, sliding across the linoleum floor. He didn’t know I was watching until I giggled and then I saw him hide a smile, satisfied with himself. I collected this moment and stashed it away in my mind with all the other gems he’s gifted me over the years. Like the time I found a Han Solo action figure in the refrigerator lying on the bottom shelf next to the soy milk. I asked my then five-yearold why Han was in there. He looked at me straight-faced through his little glasses and said, “He’s in for carbon freezing” and then went right back to playing, unaware of just how much this delighted me.
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