The New Year is upon us.  It seems that 2011 just began and now it is done.  Budgets, jobs, crazy national politics, and a first year for the GMS home made the year fly by (or maybe it only seems so due to my old age).  We have started the certification classes for the cabbing workshop.  Fine adjustments to the equipment are making quality cabbing possible.  2012 will not see the end of the world but rather the beginning of cabachon classes and slab-cutting sessions.

Next steps include ongoing efforts by the Micromount Section to set up a working area and institute active micromount investigation.  The Gem Section continues expanding the use of the hi-tech capacities of SRB.  The library is slowly accumulating fascinating materials.  Mineral and Fossil Section meetings are on-going with fascinating subjects and good participation.  Our field trips continue to product great specimens, grab-bag materials, and lapidary rough.  Folks with wire-wrapping and jewelry making skills should begin thinking and planning for expanded classes in the New Year.

Thank you to everyone who helped with the GMS table at the Mammoth Rock Show.  We received much positive attention and some new members.  Now we look forward to OUR May show.

Thank you also to all who signed the front page of this T&T issue.  Our fund raising efforts are shifting slightly from building fund purchase to building fund maintenance and Minigrant funding.

In closing, the position of Treasurer is still vacant.  If no one steps up to fill this most important position soon, we may have to investigate hiring an accountant to support our finances.  Please thoughtfully consider your talents and time and come forward to assume the vital role of money manager for GMS.

President’s Message

(Photograph by Bill Waggener)

2004 GMS President, Joan White, with GMS’s Scrapbook and AFMS Silver All American Club Award for the Year 2003. 

After years of encouragement from our own Frank Decaminada, GMS finally entered the competition in the AFMS, Education All American Club program. To enter, the club must submit a scrapbook of the club’s yearly activities (January to December). The scrapbook must be received for AFMS review by April 15th. GMS submitted a scrapbook of the 2003 club activities. As many of you know, we were very busy last year as well as this year.  GMS received a silver award in the All American Club competition. We could have easily gone gold had we had better documentation of contribution of members to other clubs and to public announcements regarding club activities. We also needed documentation of members input in influencing new legislation that could affect our hobby.

Thanks to all of you who contributed material and information for the 2003 scrapbook. Please forward any information you would like included in the 2004 scrapbook to Joan White.

(Vicki Magis shared this story with me over the telephone.  I asked her to please write it as an article so that it could be shared with everyone. – Joan White)  

I am a new member of your Georgia Mineral Society and I attended my first meeting, recently.  While there, I picked up some old copies of your newsletter and enjoyed reading them later.  I noticed that some of you mentioned giving talks for children and thought you might be interested in something I’ve been doing.

For the last three years, I’ve been a facilitator for Rainbows, which is a support group for children who are grieving either from divorce or a death in their family.  I’ve had a lot of loss in my family recently and my daughter suggested Rainbows might be good for me to try to help someone else.

I was trained by Rainbows and started out with a small group of rowdy, seven year old boys.  It was very hard to get them to talk – a facilitator is mainly for listening.

I’ve always collected rocks since I was a kid.  So I started each week we met, taking them three rocks each and plastic boxes to hold them.  We would first have a section where we talked rocks.  This caused a huge breakthrough in conversation.  The rocks started them talking about all kinds of things and started a healing process for the boys and for me.  A lot of them suffered from low self-esteem at this time in their lives and a parent quite often would tell me the boys had taken their boxes to school and talked to their classes about the rocks.  It was a miracle straight from the earth.

Sometimes, I would give something for them to do at home with a parent or grandparent or adult friend – such as cracking a geode or putting vinegar on a “popcorn” rock.

I’ve started lots of children on lifetime rock collections but my favorite story is ….  About nine years ago, I met a little niece for the first time.  I was talking to her parents at my house and I noticed her intensely studying a rock she was holding from one of my collections.  I said to her, “Do you know what that rock is you’re holding?”  And she said, “No”.  I told her it was a meteorite from outer space and said impulsively, “Would you like to have it?”  And this started a long friendship between us.  But I could never find a meteorite that felt as right as that one had, to replace it.  My daughter took me to your May, 2003 GMS Rock Show and there I found a meteorite that felt right in the palm of my hand as the old one had.

Vicki Magis