For 40 years...

For some of us that bug strikes early.  You get a taste for what the world feels like in a larger sense.  The way the sun hits your face through different atmosphere, the way food tastes just off the road, and the way an interaction can be the one that changes everything forever.  

For Barry, he set out in the 70's in search of an adventure in the form of riding his motorcycle across the US.  Somewhere out there he discovered a few pieces of turquoise that for one reason or another called to him.  He's carried those for 40 some years hoping that one day they would be of use.  

For Sohmer, she set out for Nepal to work with the refugee community on the border of India and Nepal.  It was during this period that she struck out on her own adventure. One day she found herself in Varanasi, at a hotel, using the small internet cafe. As luck would have it the interaction between her and the boy working there turned into just one of those encounters that changed everything, She met Sona. Traveling together, they fell in love. She became his moon and he, her sun.  They live there now, in Varanasi, at the palace once owned by a King.  

Travel nudges us, to step outside our comfort zones, to live in a way that is more fluid.  One day you have control, the next you realize the utter futility of that concept in it's entirety.  It's different though, day to day and place to place. Some places split open your soul as if it were just a thin veil while others make you don more armor.  You harden yourself, to protect your spirit.  Perhaps in more ways than one, and some times you look back and you feel yourself changed.  It's your awareness that's different and maybe drawing more of that fluidity is what allows you some space. To look at your hands and have a reminder, that this is not forever, it is just this moment and you are the one who decides. Will you let this harden you, or will you draw in the love that you can, remind yourself daily of the other side of the coin, and let these be the moments that make you grateful, for you are lucky enough to also know the contrary?  

The intention behind this piece is for it to serve as talisman, a reminder that on our journey's we need to be fluid, move like water, carve new paths if needed, even if through stone.  In many ways this picture of your Dad from the Grand Canyon is the perfect picture to accompany this piece, for it was formed slowly and by the power of water. This turquoise was carried by a father for 40 some years to be just where it is now.  On a ring, on the middle finger of a daughter, in India.  To remind her to stay fluid, keep her softness, stay his daughter.  What's in there is a Fathers love, his adventure, and places of belonging.  The sapphire, the stone of your birth holds dual meanings. His joy at the day you were born and the color of water.  18k was chosen since that is the most common in Indian culture. 

Stay fluid, right now it's just light through different atmosphere.