Gold Digging

My name is Bunny, and I'm a gold digger. I "dig" in thrift stores and yard sales, in antique markets and discount malls - heck, I literally dig in my yard for it. I admit it. I revel in it. And I recommend it to everyone who wants to have a maximum amount of fun (and return) with just a little bit of education.

Gemstones are difficult. There are so many levels, so many nuances on each level - raw stones vs. cut, grading with acceptable and less-than-acceptable flaws, synthetics (man made) and from-the-earth gems. I'm learning, but it's a slow, sloooow process.

Gold is easy. From where it comes from (just about every state has or has had gold mines) to how it comes (flakes or "fine" vs. nuggets or "coarse") to purity in finished product (14K, 18K, etc.) to where to buy or at least invest in, it's a one-page primer. All I have to do is type "gold" into my search engine and I get almost a billion hits.

Yellow gold, white gold, rose gold ... gold wire, gold leaf, golden boys ... gold suspended inside quartz (rutile), incidents of gold found locally, legends in which gold plays a major part ... Gold is and has always been a major player in civilization's history. We decorate ourselves, our frames, and our houses with it. We even drink it!

I just like to find it. So far I've found a gold chain ($2 at Goodwill), a necklace and two pairs of earrings (in my own collection I didn't know I had), a white gold charm ($5 at a resale shop), 7 pairs of earrings (with real precious and semi-precious stones) for $8 to $12 ea, and ... a treat.

Saturday I went to my local Salvation Army and found a couple of nice sterling pieces as well as what looked like a silver charm on a crappy, base-metal chain. (I think I'd seen it in the case before, but just noticed that chain.) It had been marked down to 99 cents, so I asked to take a closer look. It was a fairly large (for a charm) saxophone, attached to the ugly necklace by a too-big circle of even crappier metal. Interesting. I took out my magnifying glass (2X) and saw some markings, but they were kind of rubbed off so I couldn't read them very well, though I did think I saw a "5".

Now, the necklace had been there long enough for the pickers to ignore it into mark-down purgatory, but what the heck, right? For 99 cents, I'd take the risk. I took it home, put it under my halogen lamp, pulled out my loupe (10X), turned it this way and that ... a "5," yes, but not "925" (sterling). This one read "585," and very faint (in shadow I saw it) was "14K."

White gold. In British standard ("585" = 58.5% gold content) and American, and it had waited for me to come and pick it up. I weighed it (after I tossed the chain) on my handy-dandy food scale - a bit over 1/10 of an ounce. At today's prices ... and 58.5% gold content ... that's about $60. Not bad for a quick trip to a thrift store.

I will continue to be on the lookout, and - maybe - this week I'll finally get started on the actual yard-digging. While I don't have any expectation of a ring or a coin, I know that gold is one of the few metals that survive, even underground - silver gets eaten by tarnish, iron by rust, but gold only loses a bit of its alloy, and then only sometimes. Anything is possible. I can definitely live in hope, right?

I am a gold digger, after all - and proud of it!