Do the Coal Dust Polka

When I was a young girl, I had a rock collection. Mind you, the rocks I usually collected were ones from right around my house...the kind you buy from a landscaping business. But to me, these white rocks with silver flecks in them were gorgeous stones, glinting in the sunlight. I remember filling up shoe boxes with these rocks, most of them looking identical, but they were pretty to me. My parents must have just emptied the shoe boxes back into where they came from and it was starting all over for me, just as fun as the day before with my sparkly rocks.
I must not have grown out of my rock collecting stage yet because when I see a rock or a piece of coal in this situation, I'll still pick it up and inspect it. Maybe even pocket it. I know I have at least 3 cool pieces of coal in my house right now. One of them has smooth sides, on has oil on it which makes it look even shiner and more colorful and the other one was just gleaming in the sunshine when I first saw it.
These pictures are from a coal pit a couple blocks behind my house. It takes me about 20 minutes to get back there, and I always feel like an adventurer when I trek back that way. I'm still amazed by the huge coal pieces, the boulders stuck in the walls of the blown out earth and of course the massive hole in the ground. The pictures goes in a sequence from the beginning of the path, to the trailer that is sitting there slowly crumbling, a shiny chunk of coal that caught my eye, the big hole in the ground (by the way, it is something to be seen by the naked eye, these pictures barely do it justice), to a nice view from my favorite sitting rock, a picture of myself enjoying the beautiful day and then the pretty path on my way home while the sun was setting.
I love going up there, it is so quiet and peaceful. All I heard today were crickets, a dog barking the distance and then a nice song done by church bells. All in all, a relaxing place to be. It really makes you realize how small you are in such a big world. It makes me appreciate my surroundings so much more.