You meet for a reason

The second mine was fun and I was able to pick up some really big pieces for a lot less than at Panorama, but, here is the reason I chose this title for this blog, this time.  The couple from Iowa.  We’d hit it off right from the start, chatting away and talking about this and that.  At this mine we also met a couple from Minnesota and the five of us chatted.

Found out that the woman from Iowa had been battling breast cancer.  It had metastasized and gone to her bones and lymph nodes.  I got the impression that this trip, and others they had been taking, were her last hurrah.  She showed me her hands which were dried out and peeling from chemo.  I took from my pocket a ‘worry stone’ that I had collected in California all those years ago when I had cancer and sat on Moonstone beach collecting jade.

We ended up collecting two GALLONS of the stuff.  I used it in a fish tank at one time with goldfish.  It caused BLACK algae and killed all the plants and fish!  So, I have two gallons of jade if anyone wants any.

The piece I had given her was one of three I carried around.  It had been smudged, blessed, and brought me luck.  I told her my story of my lymphoma, how the stones made me FEEL, and how crystals that we were now collecting (amethysts) were ALIVE.  I told her NEVER to give up HOPE, because that defeatist attitude would defeat her before she even got started FIGHTING.  The look of wonderment on her face as I gave her this piece was worth the choked up feeling I got for the gesture.  She clasped it close, thanking me.  It felt like one of ‘those’ moments in one’s life where one instinctively does the ‘right’ thing.  We all got back to collecting Amethyst from the pile.

Later, the couple from Minnesota told me how moved they were by my story and my gesture.  I brushed it off, but I didn’t do it for the thanks.  It just felt right at that moment.  I took pictures for the couple as they had been snapping away of each other.  It’s always nice to have pictures of the two of them together to remember the trip.  I ran into both the Iowa and Minnesota couple once more as I went to pay for my bucket of Amethyst down below the mine before continuing on my trip.  Watch my next blog for my treasures that I collected!