There are three rocks in my library.
They sit above the head of an eighteenth-century Buddha, which is probably not where anyone would expect three rocks from a beach in Malibu to end up. But that is exactly where they belong.
I found them years ago while walking with Stephen along Carbon Beach. We had close friends who lived there, and the beach itself was extraordinary — beautiful homes pressed close to the Pacific, with the ocean arriving almost at their doors.
Just offshore was a massive rock. When the tide went out, an entire world appeared around it. Creatures of the sea clung to the surface. Orange and purple starfish emerged from beneath the water. The color was decadent, almost unbelievable, as if the sea had briefly opened its box of treasures.
And then, one day, I noticed three much smaller rocks lying on the beach. I wondered how far they may have traveled. They were weathered and beaten. At first glance, there was nothing especially glamorous about them. But I could see variations in the stone — lines, layers, and hints of something beneath the surface. I had the feeling that they were more beautiful than they appeared. They felt storied. Meaningful. The more I looked at them the stronger my feelings grew.
So naturally, I took them home.
What Might Be Inside
I began searching for someone who could polish the rocks. Eventually, I found a man in Colorado who agreed to do it, and I shipped them off to him. After about a month, I called and asked whether he still had my rocks. He did. They needed more polishing. Eventually another month passed, and then another. The entire process took nearly four months, which seemed an astonishingly long time for three stones I had picked up on a beach.
But when they finally came back, they were magnificent. The polishing had revealed crystals, colors, and patterns I could only faintly see before. They seemed almost transformed, although of course they had not truly become something else. Everything that made them beautiful had been there from the beginning — the polishing simply allowed the beauty to be seen.
A Different Kind of Grandeur
The rocks did not come back to me as they had existed thousands or millions of years ago. They came back with their history still inside them. Their lines and irregularities remained. The polishing did not erase what the ocean had done. It revealed a different kind of grandeur within it. This is what I love about old things when they are given another chance.
Weathered Is Not Finished
Generally, in our daily lives, we are quick to decide that something has had its day. A sofa looks worn, so we assume it should be replaced. A room feels dated, so we imagine there is nothing left to work with. A familiar object loses its shine, and suddenly we stop seeing the form, craftsmanship, or feeling that made us love it in the first place.
But weathered is not the same as finished. Sometimes the old sofa has a wonderful frame, and it simply needs to be recovered in a fabric that belongs to the life being lived around it now. Sometimes a room needs new paint, different lighting, or the furniture moved into a better conversation. Sometimes the object itself is still completely relevant. It is only the way we have been looking at it that has become tired.
I have seen this happen in homes again and again. I walk into a room with clients and suggest that we move one chair, remove one table, change the placement of the art, or bring something out of another room. Suddenly, the space feels entirely different. Clients have occasionally told me that they like the house so much after we have reconsidered it that they are no longer sure they want to move. That’s because their perception changed, not the house itself.
I remind myself often that we don’t discard people because they have aged, so why should we assume that everything else loses its worth simply because time has touched it?
Happily Ever After™.
