I was thinking old timey-er. Like a farmer sitting by a small but warm fire on a January afternoon, with nothing to do but listen to the winter wind whistling through the pines outside. There's supper in a pot over the fire, won't be ready for a while yet but it already smells like heaven. It's bouquet of salted meat and onion and herbs dried in the summer wafts along on the drafts through the rough-hewn room. His wife is there too, in the maple-wood rocking chair that he crafted and carved for her last winter, and she's putting together a new dress, stitch by stitch. The farmer smiles as he picks up a palm-sized piece of smooth stone that he brought with him from Back East. It's one of his few prized possessions, beloved and carefully kept. He takes out his smallest carving knife, the one he used to chip out the tiny bluebells on his wife's rocker, and draws it lightly across the stone, just a few quick and practiced strokes. It's edge is wicked and keen and as close to perfect as it gets on this side of the sky.
The farmer sets down the stone, wipes his hand on a rag resting on his thigh, and picks up a small, smooth, hollow shell of an egg...
;-)
) and I saw this book and HAD to get it!! 
