Guest Scrogue Kaye Lynne Booth is a Colorado-based book reviewer and writer. Her son Michael took his own life in 2008.

I’ve always been drawn to amethyst, perhaps because of the vibrant purple coloring. Purple has always been my favorite color. Although it is associated with Pisces, my March 3rd birthday falls three days after the date for me to have the February birthstone as my own. Instead I’m stuck with the stagnant blue-green of aquamarine that is the birthstone for March. I sit looking at the amethyst crystal that I found tucked in a box in storage a few days ago, pondering these things. It is oblong, tapering from a deep wine purple fat end that fades to a lighter violet, down into two thin jutting white tips. Its smooth, flat planes where other pieces have been separated from it intersect at sharp angles that catch and refract the…