I feel like you see the world with similar eyes to me in some ways. The fact you've made a post like this expressing such an intrigue in rocks in a way that makes them so much more fascinating than the every day person tends to consider. Whenever I get the chance to see a cliff edge or a coastline slowly sinking into the sea, my mind instantly zooms out of time and imagines the sheer force of motion that pushed them upwards, taking note of the grain direction, realising how those layers were once horizontal deposits of life, now somehow at a 45 degree angle.
I brought a rock home weeks in advance from up a mountain thinking it was pretty cool and a good birthday gift for a friend. Turns out it wasn't, so I had to act like it was a joke gift haha... Damn took me ages to find just the right rock.
But yeah, it's nice to go out and appreciate surroundings for what they really are, something I can't wait to be able to do again one day after so many years!
(I meant to comment days ago before pay-out... but oh well!)
Back at Uni one of my professors had a similar thing. He could talk about a pile gravel for an hour straight and it would be fascinating at the same time. Some people would laugh at it. I pitied them for the lack of imagination. While my imagination always runs wild, trying to picture places and processes in nature as they formed. Or like studying old maps of a town and then walking in that town and realizing that the streets I am walking used to be a part of the old fortress, for example. Seeing things that are not immediately visible.
Aww, I am so sorry to hear about your rock. :( I sometimes bring small rocks home from places and they sit around the house. And a few of them even serve as cool looking door stops. But yea, I guess it is not for everyone.
I hope you have a bunch of such traveling/wandering soon! And that you will share about it here! :)
This is my favourite condolence of the year hahaha =) Glad we're on the same wavelength geologically speaking
Pretty hard to travel these days but I'll try a couple more times before I finally head back to UK =D