this story originally appeared in the philippine daily inquirer on November 20, 1999.
I had to run an errand a few days ago, one that required me to go to the market. I decided to put on my high-cut rubber shoes because I knew from experience that I would be walking on wet, muddy aisles. On my way to the nearest jeepney stop, I felt a small stone inside one shoe. The thing immediately began to irritate me, but I didn’t want to take my shoe off in the middle of the street. I didn’t particularly want people to see my foot, of which I am not proud. So the small stone bothered me the whole time I was in the market.
When I reached home an hour and a half later, the first thing I did was to remove my shoes. The stone fell out and I picked it up, thinking of throwing it away. But something stopped me. My Muse called me once more, in such an unlikely time and for such an unlikely cause, and set my mind wandering and wondering. Stones are very common things. They can be found everywhere, and nobody gives them any second thought. But if one looks at them from different angles, one realizes that they too have the power to fascinate. Take my stone, for instance. It’s a gray one and quite ordinary except when light hits some small particles to make it sparkle. I stare at it and my mind begins to consider it scientifically. I don’t know what type of stone it is, but I can state with certainty that it’s metamorphic because it has the hardness and compactness that only a stone which has undergone pressure and heat exhibits. I have ruled out the possibility that it is igneous, because it lacks the characteristic smoothness of volcanic rocks, or that it is sedimentary, because it doesn’t have a layered look and crumbly feel.
Then when my analysis of the stone as stone runs its course, the writer in me takes over. I begin to wonder: If this stone, this bland piece of gray which had been kicked and stepped on before it found its way to my shoe, could talk, what tale would it tell? What sights have it seen? What momentous events has it witnessed? If it has feelings, how does it feel? If it could make a wish, what would it wish? So many questions and so many stories, inspired by such a small common thing! It doesn’t end there. This piece of stone, my mind observes, has existed since the birth of this world, springing from nothing. It has undergone centuries of cyclic change: from igneous, to sedimentary, to metamorphic and in the future it will melt again in the heart of the earth and there resume the process of birth and rebirth. It has existed long before I did and witnessed the birth of the very first of my ancestors–only to find its way into my shoe, and be thrown back to the ground where, I am sure, it will witness the birth of every new generation of man, until it returns to the nothing from which it came. My mind continues to ponder the allegory of stones: how the creation of a piece of stone parallels closely the life of a man.
First, igneous–born out of the fire-hot love of his parents and his family. Next, sedimentary–passing through childhood and adolescence, accumulating bits and pieces of other people’s lives to help him build one of his own. And finally, metamorphic–either strengthened or scarred by time, life and fate and formed into either a precious gem or generic pebble, until he himself gives birth to another life, to another stone. When my musings end, I take the stone and lay it down on the table. I take a pen and a piece of paper and start writing about this small, gray piece of hardened earth. One day someone is likely to come into my room and see the (not quite) worthless stone, pick it up and throw it outside, where, hopefully, it will find its way into another person’s shoe, and set his mind wandering and wondering. Imagine, all this from a small stone.
