When Cleavage Comes To Mind...

...I think of quartz crystals. As a child, I was an avid rock collector. All shapes, sizes, textures, constitutions, origins, everything that appealed to me was scooped up and given a home in an ever growing box of my little treasures.

Even now, I still am influenced by my childhood games, and I constantly notice certain rocks that appeal to me. Luckily, in Yugoslavia, there isn't only oceans, there's rocks everywhere. On the mountains, nearby cities, and by the seashore. And not just your usual grey, round, found by the pound stones.

Instead, the most amazing colours and designs on structures of all sorts. It's a treasure mine sitting next to a azure landscape, and after a good swim it's back to sitting and searching. The tides wash away sand and bring them up to the surface, glimmering like jewels and lost conquests of the ages.

The results of my labor were worth the strolls along the shoreline, squinting and tossing back rock after rock of dejected fare. So, along with fragmented sea shells, I packaged them up in a towel and brought them home, only to face a dilemma.

After the water had dried, which in this heat is seconds, they looked bland and uninteresting. The richness of colour and texture had vanished with the moisture. Forlornly, I dumped the pile in a pan of water and sat there, staring at it. What was a girl to do?

I wanted them to stay in their pristine state of perfection for everyone to be able to see how wonderful they were. Oh well, nothing stays beautiful forever, as so says the most basic law of nature. But then again, there was always a way to cheat.

And so with a bright idea and free time on my hands, I grabbed a bottle of clear nail polish and set to work. The results were wonderful, and I congratulated myself on completing the task at hand. Oh bother, if only now there wasn't so many rocks I liked, and so little nail polish...