A Lesson Learned

Recently i came up with a good idea for an item in my materials collection, shark cartlidge vertebrae. It occurred to me that if i carved out the center they would make great beads . . . well, for dreadlocks. My son, Raven happens to have dreadlocks so at first it started as a gift for him. One day I decided that there was no reason i shouldn't offer these up for sale. I started to carve sets of three and make them available in my Etsy shop.

I discovered several fossil grade shark vertebrae for sale online and battled the online auction and finally won. A fistful of dollars got me the small handful of vertebrae, but i figured that since they were fossil grade they would be solid and stone-like and i could set stones in silver around them. You know, really work up some nice pieces of ancient fossil and gem dread beads for the discerning dread head.

Unfortunately, when they arrived i realized that the cartlidge hadn't weathered the eons since the Megalodon Era very well. Well, perhaps its the fact that they weren't bone or that they weren't petrified, but some of them exibited a frailness i hadn't expected.

Some of them may be all right for what i had originally intended, it will take a bit more scrutiny and experimentation to be sure, so my efforts (and investment) may not be completely in vain.

It's all part of the process, the fun of experimentation and learning, using new materials and techniques, coming up with ideas and manifesting them.