Apache Tear (Black Translucent Obsidian)

Sinderella's note

Apache tears are small smooth pieces of black obsidian — translucent if you hold them up to the lamp. Folk lore: the women of an Apache tribe wept after a battle, and the tears turned to stone. Sinderella holds one in her hand at funerals. It does not *take* grief. It *holds it with you* until you can put it down. Buy one. Carry it.

The long version

Apache tears are small, palm-sized pieces of *translucent* black obsidian — hold one up to a lamp and you can see the light pass through the dark. The name comes from a story attributed to the Apache nation: after a battle, the women of the tribe wept on a cliffside, and their tears turned to stone where they fell. Whether you take the legend literally or not, the stone has been used for over a century in folk grief work. Sinderella holds one in her hand at funerals, at hard hospital visits, at the long quiet hours after a breakup. It is *not* a stone that takes grief away — that's a fantasy. It's a stone that *holds grief with you* in a tactile way, gives the hand something to do when the heart can't do anything yet. The classic folk practice: keep one in your pocket through a hard month, hold it when the grief surges, set it in a small dish at home when you don't need it that day. After the hard month is over, return the stone to running water — a creek, a Jersey Shore tide, or just cold tap water — and thank it. Apache tears are inexpensive on Amazon, usually sold in small sets. Get *one* good one rather than a baggie of small ones — you want a piece that fits your palm. Saint Anne (the patron of grandmothers and grief) for the ones we lose. Saint Therese of Lisieux for the small acts of getting through a Tuesday.