The stone sat on the front lawn, grey and solid. Over the years, a third of the stone had sunk into the dirt but it’s overall shape was a smooth oval. The whippersnipper kept the grass around it neat and trimmed but people failed to notice it any more. It had originally been placed as a decorative element for the front garden, dragged out when the basement was being dug and dropped from the bobcat scoop where it lay to this day.

It’s surface was lined now, years of exposure to the elements showed wear and tear, could it have shrunk? It seemed smaller. I was busy planting some annuals around it when a voice from the sidewalk said, “It’s alive you know.”

I turned to see an elderly man, standing with his hands jammed into trousers that had seen better days, a battered cap on his head. He squinted through his glasses and I realized he was talking about the stone.

I stood up and waited for more.

“Rocks are just on a different time scale than us.”

“I hadn’t thought of it like that,” I said.

“Everything on this planet is alive you know, that rock is still evolving. How long have you had it?”

“About twenty years I think”, I said.

“And where did it come from?”

“Right here, where the basement is now.”

“There’s it’s story then. The lake is at the bottom of the road so it likely was moved with the various melting glaciers thousands of years ago, and now it’s in your care.”

I nodded. He was right. That rock had a history and now had become part of mine.

He turned and walked off toward the lake. I’d never seen him before but I hoped he’d return and I could talk with him some more about what we call ‘ time’.

(C) Chris Beryl 2018

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