A Geologist is Born?

My child loves rocks right now.  The boy sees a rock, he picks it up.  He looks at it.  He shows it to us, and we look at it.  Then Zane puts the rock into his pocket, and it comes home with him, where it used to be surreptiously tossed outside.   Unfortunately, the boy caught on to my rock tossing, and I was told under no uncertain terms that those were HIS rocks.  I tried telling him that rocks belong outside, but this did not compute.  Finally I told him that no rocks were allowed inside the house until they had a bath first. I thought this would stall him for a bit, until I found him outside with the hose, cleaning his rocks.  I had to admire his tenacity, since apparently that trait is genetic.   
 
There was a time when Zane loved trains.  Loved them.  He would sit for hours playing with his trains.  He'd line them up, one after the other, all along the front of the entertainment center, or along the lines of the tile in the kitchen.  We bought him a train table, thinking that he would like that better, but he didn't.  He didn't want to go round and round. Lining up the trains suited him best, so we finally just left him to it. We read books about trains, and found some YouTube videos of trains. We visited the Texas Transportation Museum, where they have lots of little trains to watch. We even took him to Grapevine, Texas to ride an actual steam train.  Zane enjoyed all of these, but then one day he wasn't all that interested in trains anymore, which was great, since we were running out of train activities.  Zane found a new hobby.

These rocks were in my purse!

Zane has found some interesting rocks, including a few that he calls his "dinosaur teeth".  I've asked him on several occasions why he likes rocks.  Is it a sensory thing?  I enjoy holding flat stones in my palm because of their shape, but  Zane doesn't seem partial to a particular kind of rock.  He's got flat stones, round rocks, chunks, and flints.  I'd like to be able to tell him about the rocks he's found, except that all I remember from my Earth Science classes in high school is the word 'igneous'.  I probably should have paid more attention. 

Since school started, Zane has been bringing rocks home in his back pack.  Not just one or two--Dozens.  I could pave a driveway with the rocks that we now have in a box in the pantry.  I've tried to take the rocks back to his school.  Zane's behavior is stealing, after all.  I placed all of the little rocks that I could back into his backpack while he was asleep.  The next morning, I hauled all those rocks back to school and when I brought Zane to his homeroom, I spoke to the teacher's aide about it.

Me: "Uh, I don't know if you've noticed, but Zane has been collecting rocks during recess. He has half of your playground rocks in his backpack.  You probably want those back?"
Teacher's Aide:  "Okay."

The rocks came back home that evening. I sent them back the next day.  They came back.  This went on for about a week, and then I made an executive decision and threw all the little rocks out into the garden. If the school doesn't care that their playground is bereft of gravel, why should I?  I kept a bunch of the big rocks.  I also went out and bought a book about rocks, and one of those activity kits from the Smithsonian where you chisel rocks out of a brick of plaster. If you can't beat them, join them.   Who knows?  Perhaps his interest in rocks will lead him to a career in geology, or more likely, he'll learn all he wants to know about rocks and then he'll be on to the next hobby.