She remembered the heat and dust mostly They’d stopped at a gas station where she’d never seen so many kids in one family, and there she’d caught sight of a line of what would come to be known as pet rocks in the office/store window. They were just smooth stones really, but with stuck-on eyes. A line of them getting bigger, a couple wearing moustaches. The last one a sheriff.

Her mother pulled her by the arm toward the signed bathroom as she'd said emphatically “What kind of fool could waste money on things so stupid.” Linda kept them in her line of vision while her mother dragged her out of sight.

Growing up in California was exciting and she was soon hanging out at the beach getting stoned too often. Fortunately, before it was too late, she realized that her life required a more spiritual aspect.

During the eighties she came to Australia for a tantric workshop and met Fernando. She really got to know him well during those three intimate days. They even had to shit in the same bucket. As a matter of fact all the focus on sex and spirituality had left her feeling horny. And he was the one she wanted.

Later that night, after accepting a dinner invitation from Fernando, they returned to her hotel room and found bliss in the form of aromatic candles, massage oil, and tantric music.

Fernando massaged her long brown legs and told her he’d had the best holiday in his life, and then kept silent while he completed the smooth and tender massage that totally relaxed her.

Then it was his turn and he felt nice just watching her pour oil onto the palms of her hands.

He rolled over, she started with his feet but soon had reached the top of his thighs with a hand sliding up each side to ‘accidentally’ brush his genitals. Soon he’d rolled over and after doing the front of his lower legs and thighs she was moving her hands up over his rippling 6 pack. She poured a little more oil onto her upturned palm thinking that soon she should start stroking his penis lightly, she knew her prominent breasts were turning him on no-end so she waved them close to his face, inadvertently bumping him in his wide open eye with the rather large crystal hanging from a gold chain around her neck.

“Ooops! Are you okay? I didn’t realize I was so close.”

“That hurt… A little bit. ,,,,,So how about taking it off?”

“Take it off? Never! That’s my rose-crystal and I’ll always wear it.”, and went on massaging, doing both arms, the right then the left before moving back to where she was swinging her tits in his face again, thinking that very soon, as soon as she had finished doing his hands and face, they would be able to make the shift from massage to genuine foreplay, when the crystal hit him again, in the tooth that time.

“Really, can you take that thing off. It’s dangerous.” Fernando suggested strongly.

“Dangerous? How can you say that? It is a powerful healing crystal.”

“Cummon, it’s just a pet rock.”

“How can you say that?”! Over-reacted Linda, bursting into tears, subconsciously remembering the disparaging remark her mother had made so long ago. “You have no right to tell me what to do! This is my beautiful rose crystal.” And the evening crumbled from there.



Many years later…..

Blubbering to herself “It’s true, it’s true, what Fernando said all those years ago”. The ring on her finger, the diamond that she had thought signified so much, had revealed itself to be nothing more than just another pet rock. “What a fool I’ve been. At least I know now. But my life has almost gone“  she absent-mindedly mumbled to her reflection in the plate-glass window of the petrol station.”

“You okay lady?”

“Oh, you wouldn’t understand, No really I’m fine. I’m letting go, just letting go of an old pet. Cryptically she said to the hippie-looking young woman, as she fingered the stone on her other hand.

“That’ll be twenty five dollars thanks”.

“Is the road down to Gulliver’s Lookout still gravel?” Linda asked the young woman, subconsciously needing to let her know that she had been there before. When the girl had finished counting out the change she looked up at her from her hunched position.

“Gravel? When was it gravel? How old are you lady, anyway”

That fazed her too, like yesterday, when the guy had given up his seat for her.

Anyway, it didn’t matter. Everything was ending, nothing more than to tidy up the edges. Put things back in their place. Come to terms with a life built on sand.

The road was good bitumen, all the way to the lookout that had become a fairly large park with quite a nice covered picnic area where once there had been only a small open-sided corrugated iron shelter, but, despite the more serious fencing, the view, the panorama, the entire awesomeness of the canyon landscape and the roar of the falls; it hadn’t changed at all.

“That day, just the two of us, the sun still bright on the far cliffs, we were standing there holding on to each other for what seemed like eternity, and, then, the way he pulled back to look into my eyes, holding my elbows, and promising undying love before taking out the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen, and slipping it onto my finger.

Anyway, it all turned out to be like this. In the end. How long it took for me to realize that Fernando had been right for all those years. The ‘pet rock’! Why couldn’t I see it? We invest in symbols that obscure reality, or sometimes annihilate the symbolism itself. That crystal. My rose crystal that I’d bought all filled up with significance by the young sales person and carried away by me as an enthusiastic accomplice. If only I could have known it would do to Fernando! How stupid was I?”

“And now this thing. One more pet rock. One more tiny chunk of insignificance. Sharp and transparent. Expensive, but worth nothing in the end. Don’t let appearances fool you. Don’t jump to conclusions. Be careful what you project. Oh, the dreams I’ve followed! The fool I’ve been! Where are you Eric? Why are you so weak?” she muttered as she ambled up to the mesh fence and galvanised railing at the lookout point.

“To the cosmos!” she said in a subdued party voice sliding the ring from her finger, lifting it up to her ear and tossing it forward three meters before it quickly turned downward and disappeared behind the mass of stone that made up the precipice leaving nothing but a sharp ping as it glanced off an outcrop somewhere below.

That kind of felt better she thought. And then a thousand other things as she watched a young eagle flying on the updrafts for a minute until she turned with tears in her eyes, and began walking back to her car when she suddenly noticed three very untidy young people with hair that looked like it belonged on the crutch of neglected sheep.

“Ya fuckin’ old bourgeoisies bitch!” one of the worst looking ferals yelled at her, waving a carved staff and baring his filthy teeth. “Don’t be ridding yourself of unwanted pets around here Ritchbitch. You’re desecrating the eden with your feral intrusions.”

“What are you talking about?” She asked sharply when brought out from her reverie. “Have you lost your marbles?”

“Get back to where you came from Granny!” A weedy little dreadlocked semi-human shrieked from inside a hessian smock smeared with ash and ochre. “We don’t need your type around here!” he continued, drawing her attention away from the born-feral treehugger sneaking up behind her.

“You are at the feet of the sacred mother mountain. Bow down and worship.” He continued, staff held high.

“Ahh!  Another pet rock!!” she was screaming as she was whacked on the skull with a large stone he’d randomly selected.

It was a sad end for a woman intent on escaping the curse of the pet rock but as they say the road to hell is paved with good intentions and cruelty could be defined by her laughing headstone when the moon was full.