Off to a good start here. Recently read a hot topic on hoarders here on Mindat. Had to say I was very impressed at peoples comments. Its always a beautiful thing to hear opinions that transcend a persons immediate position/perspective. Sadly upon conclusion I realized that I have indeed fallen into the hoarder category.
I think laziness is the mitigating factor. I have been a construction/roofer type, most of my life. Nothing excites my fellow roofer/hounder buddies and I, quite so much as the idea of hiking miles over a foothill in the dark with a pack full of tools digging for hours, then hiking out with a 80+lb hardpack on the back. lg sweet cofee and back up on the roof. Not really a physical laziness,I am more of a mental gumshoe.
What about a camera, a pen and paper for notes, safety glasses, a gps to trace floor veins. evidently these are all things that were just a little to heavy to make it into my pack, as I grow old and fuzzy I begin to look back with deepest regret.I have seen pink pockets a man could stand in, with football sized calcites, yet no pictures. I have seen walls move back a couple football fields worth in area, have followed the veins every step of the way. Yet I am still clueless to most patterns, shifts,or locations of the sweet spots.No pen/paper no gps. I am amazed I can still see! how many times have I blimked at the last milisecond, catching a sharp spinning shard of agate in the tearduct. A few weeks ago I caught a drop of micro actinolite mud straight in my eye. With both hands covered in mud and full raingear on, it was quite a challenge to find a clean patch of clothing I could rag it out with. I had to watch sad movies for a week before it all came out! Maybe these implements just didnt seem manly at the time,but I wonder how much better my vision might be.
The laziness of this hoarder runs deep. It is a mental Laziness. I had always prided myself with my interest in the micro and the rare. while my freinds obsessed with bigger pockets and bigger quartz and calcite cluters. I was usually more concerned with the small pockets, near the mud vein.or the dust at the bottom of a fully matured pocket. sometimes a handful of that dust could yield hundreds of perfect little floaters. It always amazed me how often it was overlooked for chiseling the big plates on the sides.I am not greedy as I have given away whole boxes of clusters to people who have shown an interest. I once gave a box of my most prized datolites to a Deadhead on tour because I was so impressed by his wrapping craft. It was payback enough to see those beautiful apple green stones gracing so many necks a few weeks later. The thing that upsets me is, How many Id tags have I filled out for my collection. A big fat zero on that one.My laziness embarasses me! These are the facts that make me a HOARDER! Where would these pieces go if I was gone? With no location tags, they would be homeless!
I recently started to try and label some of my rarer pieces and ran into a slight snarl, I dont know what they are!!! No problem, Ill just go on Mindat and ask for help. Now theres a place where my laziness steps into new territories, almost malignent now. Because if I read the HOW TO POST section, there is clearly enough info for me to identify at least half of what I have posted. What was I thinking? cant find the vinegar? Another case of mental slacking, hoping someone else will do it for me, and some folks did! They actually went thru the trouble of posting pics for me to compare to.and Posting a pic on mindat is time conusming at least.To you I apologize and I thank you for your time:) I will try to be less Lazy in the future. Mindat's WHAT IS IT is a great discussion however, good willed laziness can really bog it down. I think I shall only use it after using up all other ID options.
I guess my point in all this rambling is that there is much more to being a rockhound than digging and packing. I dont think Im alone in my dilemna here. I know the Mohs scale, but how many times have I practiced it, Streak, Cleavage, luster, fracture,specific gravity,crystals systems. Why do these terms so intimadate my puny mental might? Yet, I will Press on, undaunted, for in these terms, there lies the difference, between a geologist and a Treasure Troll John Bean