My wife and I enjoyed a fine day in the Blue Mountains outside Sydney the other day, led by a happy-go-lucky Aussie named Justin (“think Timberlake, not Bieber” he admonished).  All went well until we went to pick up another American couple who took the option of a walk-about along the Grand Canyon (not quite like the one in USA, this one being a bit shallower and filled with gum trees, but impressive nonetheless).  They’d been set off with a “no worries, Mate” when the fellow asked for directions. “Just follow the one-and-only trail until you get to the trail-point labelled ‘Leap’,” said Justin.  When the intrepid trekkers failed to show, our guide sang a different tune.  “I’m going to have to fill out an awful lot of paperwork,” he kept lamenting as we sat around for some hours hoping to hear from the missing hikers.

Eventually they were located, having taken a wrong turn on the supposedly forkless path.

At times like this I am happy to have my worry stone to roll around my fingers.  I picked up a new one this trip at an aboriginal culture center.  It is a river rock picked up as a “dreaming stone” by a native Australian whose wife painted it with a colorful kangaroo—a symbol of strength.  That’s just what I need in times when things go kerflooey such as the Bieberesque moment that Justin endured.

“The hand can operate as a director of consciousness—a tool or agent for the mind in achieving a mental state in which people will be able to get the outcome they want.”

– Frank R. Wilson, neurologist (quote reported by Sue Shellenbarger of Wall Street Journal in a report this week on the mental value of “clicking, stretching, twirling, flipping, squeezing or fiddling with everyday objects”).

So long as I have a worry (or dream) stone there can be no great worries, other than one big one–it going missing.  I worry about that night and day.