Turquoise

Navajo, Zuni and Puebloan silversmiths are setting turquoise this week, as work and as inheritance. It is a living material, not a look.

It forms near the surface, where water carrying copper soaks into dry rock and fills the cracks.

Most cheap turquoise is dyed howlite or magnesite, and some of it is plastic. Even real turquoise is usually resin filled, because it is soft and porous.

Aries, you move first so that nobody gets the chance to talk you out of it.

Hesitation got treated as weakness in front of you when you were small. So you built a self that never pauses, and now you cannot tell a good idea from a fast one.

The clearing up afterwards is always yours, and it is quietly wearing you out.

Slow is not the same as scared.

In Navajo, Zuni and Puebloan life turquoise is worn, inherited and made into work by living artists. In a tourist shop it is a colour on a shelf.

The gap between those two things is where the fakes live. Most cheap turquoise is dyed howlite or magnesite, and some of it is plastic.

Even the real stone is usually held together with resin, because turquoise is soft and porous.

Taurus, you have paid for the difference between a thing and a picture of a thing.

Somebody gave you a cheap version of something once and expected gratitude for it. You took it, you said thank you, and you have never forgotten the weight of it in your hand.

Now you would rather own one real thing than a drawer of nearly.

That is a standard somebody made you pay for.

A Navajo or Zuni piece can pass down through three generations and still be worn every day. That is what the material is for.

Turquoise is porous. Sweat, oils and sunscreen soak in and stay, which is why old turquoise goes green.

That softness is also why almost all of it is resin stabilised, and why so much of what is sold is dyed howlite instead.

Gemini, nearly everything on that shelf has been helped, and you have never once asked for help out loud.

Somebody laughed at you for being earnest once, in a group. You decided never again, and now you get in first with the joke about yourself.

It works. Nobody can hurt you with something you said first, and nobody can reach you either.

Say one earnest thing this week.

Somewhere right now a Navajo woman is wearing turquoise that belonged to her grandmother. It is not a symbol to her. It is family.

The stone drinks in everything it touches. Sweat, soap and perfume soak straight in and turn blue stone green over the years.

That is why nearly all of it is resin filled, and why the cheap version is dyed howlite in the first place.

Cancer, you are the one keeping your family's things, and nobody asked whether you wanted the job.

You come home carrying somebody else's mood in your jaw. You cannot always tell which parts of an evening were actually yours.

You started doing that for an adult who needed managing, and nobody ever told you the job had ended.

Take it off before you wash your hands.

Turquoise comes out of dry country, where water carrying copper soaked into the rock and filled the seams. That is Navajo, Zuni and Puebloan land, and the stone is still worn and worked there.

Most of what sells as turquoise is dyed howlite or magnesite. Some of it is plastic.

Even genuine turquoise is usually resin filled, because it is too soft and too porous to survive being worn otherwise.

Leo, you are the one who makes it a good night, and nobody asks what that took.

Somebody at home was only warm when you were entertaining. So you learned to earn the room every single time you walk into one.

You are still doing it at thirty, in kitchens where nobody would have minded a quiet you.

The quiet one is allowed in.

Zuni inlay and needlepoint work sets tiny cut turquoise by hand, piece after piece, and it is being made right now. Navajo silversmiths have worked it for generations.

The material is soft and porous. Left alone it takes in sweat, oils and sunscreen and slowly turns green.

So most commercial turquoise is stabilised with resin, and a great deal of what is sold as turquoise is dyed howlite.

Virgo, you have been stabilised so many times that you no longer know which cracks were yours.

Somebody in your house had a temper that only landed when things were untidy. You made tidy your entire defence, and it worked often enough to keep.

Thirty years on you still clean before a difficult conversation instead of having it.

The house is fine.

Turquoise is handed down in Navajo, Zuni and Puebloan families and worn by whoever receives it. Living people, present tense, not a museum case.

The stone is soft, around five or six, and porous enough to take in whatever touches it.

That is why nearly all of it is resin stabilised, and why cheap turquoise is usually dyed howlite sold under a better name.

Libra, you were handed a role in your family before you could speak, and you have worn it every day since.

Somebody's disappointment used to be the loudest thing in your house. You got very good at heading it off before it ever arrived in the room.

Thirty years on you still pick the restaurant that will upset the fewest people, including the ones who are not there.

Your turn was never going to be offered.

To Navajo, Zuni and Puebloan people turquoise is worn, inherited and worked by living artists. To a market stall it is a price point.

That gap is why the fakes exist. Dyed howlite and magnesite get sold as turquoise outright, and some of it is nothing but plastic.

Even the honest material is usually resin filled, because turquoise is soft and drinks in whatever it touches.

Scorpio, you can tell when somebody is performing sincerity, and it has never made you popular.

You learned to read people young. Getting it wrong in that house had a cost you can still describe in detail.

So you check everybody, and people feel checked, and the ones with something to hide call you intense.

You were right about that person.

Right now somebody in Zuni or on the Navajo Nation is wearing turquoise that means family and place. That has never stopped being true, and it is not a style.

Turquoise forms where copper-bearing water soaks into dry rock and fills the seams. It comes out soft and porous.

So almost all of it is resin stabilised, and most cheap turquoise is dyed howlite or magnesite wearing the name.

Sagittarius, you were made in a dry place out of whatever seeped into the cracks, and you have never called that hard.

Your childhood was a list of things you were told not to try. It was delivered by people who were frightened rather than cruel, and nobody explained the difference.

So you argue with every closed door, including the ones that are simply closed.

Some doors are only doors.

Turquoise formed in dry country, near the surface, where copper-bearing water filled the cracks in the rock. That country is Navajo, Zuni and Puebloan land, and the stone is still worn and worked there.

Almost none of the turquoise in a shop is untouched. Most is resin stabilised, and much of what is labelled turquoise is dyed howlite.

The reason is plain. Turquoise is soft and porous and will not survive being worn without help.

Capricorn, you have been stabilised so you are easier to handle, and you call that being reliable.

You keep a private ledger where rest is a debit and grief is a debit. The year you carried a family is a blank line in it.

Somebody early on paid you in approval only for output, and you kept the terms.

Nobody who stayed was auditing you.

Navajo and Zuni artists are cutting and setting turquoise this month, for their own families and for sale on their own terms. It is theirs.

The material is soft and porous, so nearly all commercial turquoise is filled with resin to survive being worn at all.

Most of the cheap blue on a market stall is dyed howlite or magnesite, or plastic with a good story attached to it.

Aquarius, you had to be filled in with something before you could survive being worn every day.

You worked out early that being interesting got you further than being upset. So you turned everything difficult into a subject and handed people the analysis.

They never get the thing underneath, and then you are surprised to feel unknown.

Say the unanalysed version to one person.

In Navajo, Zuni and Puebloan families turquoise is passed on and worn by the next person, and the artists making it are alive and working now.

A stone worn for fifty years goes green. Turquoise is porous, and sweat and oils and sunscreen soak in and stay in.

That softness is why nearly all of it is resin stabilised, and why so much of what is sold is dyed howlite instead.

Pisces, you take on what is in the room and carry it home in your body.

There was somebody whose moods you learned to feel before they spoke. Being right about them kept the whole house calm, so nobody ever asked you to stop.

Now you cannot always tell whose sadness you are holding, and you apologise for it either way.

Some of that was never yours to carry.