What are the most awesome things you've ever touched?

Recently I realized that as ordinary as my life sometimes seems, I have touched and/or held some amazing things in this world in my coming-up-40 years. My list includes:

A 4-carat nearly colorless nearly flawless set diamond (jewelry store)
A piece of the moon (Oregon's Governor's office on a grade-school field trip)
A piece of the Swiss Alps (Brought back from its origin by a native friend visiting family)
A live shark (Oregon Coast Aquarium during vacation just last year)
An actual original copy of the Mars satellite radar-mapping outputs from the probe that went off course (in the home of the artist who used them to make a 90% accurate Mars globe in bronze, 1 copy for the Smithsonian and 1 for the JPL lobby if I remember correctly)
A bantam rooster who loves to cuddle (my mom's house rooster)
Several members of Ladysmith Black Mambazo who shook my hand after a performance earlier this year (cannot recommend their performances enough; it's easy to hear why they are legendary!)
An Archbishop (I'm not Catholic--I'm not even denominational that way) who shook my hand after a Christmas mass attended with my stepmother
And, topping it off perfectly for a nature nut like me, thanks to a friend with a USDA exotics-keeping license, several of his pets--including a cougar in my lap and a black leopard.

And, still my absolute perfect shining favorite moment of being a nature nut who lives through touch more than a lot of others, thanks to the same guy, **a real, live, healthy, happy, affectionate SNOW LEOPARD**.

Let's see some lists, memories, anything! What amazing parts of history and/or nature have you held or touched in your travels?

What a cool idea. Thanks for the moments.

Mine would have to include celebrities past and present.

As a kid, I lived in Santa Ana, CA. My brothers and I used to go to the beaches and watch the bands who played in the evenings. The list includes the ever-popular Beach Boys. On one such evening, one of them asked who the cute little girl was and shook my hand. I have no idea which one it was. I was too young then. ^_^

A few years ago, I lived not too far from where the movie The Stand was being filmed. I had the opportunity to meet Stephen King. That was my greatest handshake EVER. He is my all-time favorite author.

On the morning of my 1st wedding, we went to a cave that had an icicle that was reported to be very old. The story was it was a couple of hundred years old. It was cool enough in the cave to keep the icicle from melting completely and, in the winter, would grow larger.

Back in the 1970s or 1980's, Pharaoh Ramses II toured the USA. I touched the sarcophagus.

The oldest thing I've touched is an amalgam of sea creatures from the Cambrian period, approximately 500 million years old. Touching that and trying to think of a time when they were alive was difficult but intriguing! LOL I have touched many fossils from the Triassic, Jurassic, and Cretaceous Periods. My DH and I are amateur paleontologists and have gone of many a dig. In 1999, I was present, and got to touch, a new species of Ankylosaurus that was discovered here in UT.

By far the greatest thing I've touched was my granddaughter, Aurora. I got to touch her when she was less than 10 minutes old.

kwanjin, those are really fantastic! Other than Ladysmith Black Mambazo, I have actually met two of my very favorite sci-fi celebrities, Brian Froud and Dr. David Brin. If you're unfamiliar with the names, Froud is the man who designed the muppets for Labyrinth (with David Bowie) and the entire *movie* The Dark Crystal for Jim Henson to build. Dr. Brin has 2 PhD's, one of which I always forget and the other in freakin' astrophysics! He's the only "hard" sci-fi author whose work I can read--otherwise I have to stick with the fluffy fantasy junk or horror sci-fi, because hard sci-fi is tech-based and I'm kind of technologically retarded most days. Back in the mid-90s some of M. C. Escher's most famous works went on tour, and while I did not touch any I did have the remarkable experience of being able to brace on the wall, breathe downward flutist-style through my mouth, and practically cross my eyes studying the center of one of those amazing puzzle-piece-lizard mosaics! Security was watching me VERY closely but never approached as I never actually messed with anything, and I was able to see that in the center the lizards got down to 3 mm before he stopped inscribing eyeballs and toes! I still regret being unable to see the Da Vinci or Smithsonian exhibits on tour, and I do hold out hope for someday hitting one of the "digger for a day" dino sites out east by Choteau or Bear Gulch. I still laugh remembering how it was decided what could go on the Smithsonian tour; after many many hours of meetings the verdict was: "You can't have the Hope Diamond, the Betsy Ross American flag, or the Spirit of St. Louis. Have fun with the rest of EVERYTHING ELSE in the museum."

But the live, happy, wiggly, scratch-right-there-oooooooo snow leopard still wins on my list! Tho I am not child-friendly and do not have any of my own, I can sure believe Aurora wins on yours!

My most awesome 'touch' was a Stingray at Gulf World, here in PCB - they are soft as velvet and gentle as kittens - a truely amazing moment for me! In San Diego, I was allowed to touch a sea anemone - another soft and gentle creature, but nothing could compare to 'petting' a stingray!

Snake, I know both those names!!! Dr. Brin would be the one I would MOST like to meet. His writing is amazing. I very much enjoyed The Postman and Cyclops before Kevin Costner got a hold of it. (I did like the movie, too.)

I got to touch a Claude Monet painting once. One of our universities museum of fine arts had one that was on tour. One of his seaside ones. I don't remember the name. Oh, I didn't actually touch the painting but the frame. That still counts, doesn't it? LOL

Stingrays are soooo velvety smooth.

This message was edited Jul 16, 2010 3:05 PM

Hmm, interesting topic.

We have been to several airplane museums, I have touched planes that flew in WW I and II, most famous would be the Enola Gay, now sitting in a new air museum in Virginia. This plant dropped The Bomb on Hiroshima. (well, I can't swear you could actually touch that but it's there)

I forgot about the airplanes. LOL I have touched, and been inside, the Spruce Goose. That was Howard Hughes' plane and the largest plane ever to fly.

A tiny baby bunny, or wild young bird. It is an awe-some feeling to get in touch with a wild creature. Ain't no Snow Leopard, but still ...! Imagine that!
I did touch a huge snake once in a teen science program, nobody else wanted to. Pfftt.

I've held a Hummingbird in my hand and stroked its head - amazing feeling - so soft and beautiful. Still, 'petting' the Stingray was what really impressed me the most.

Horseshoe crab!!! Those suckers are so weird looking underneath!!!

Sounds corny, but I would have to say my cats. They are so soft and warm. Their breathing is so alive, and I just love to feel them purr.

Well, I missed my chance to touch the Spruce Goose--we didn't have time to stop at the aviation museum last time we blew through McMinnville, more's the pity :(. Only about a month ago, too. Meanwhile, though, I have a spectacular addition to my list as of this morning, though I did not touch it barehanded! Suspecting a wing injury, I had to catch the bat shown below and hand it off to a wildlife rehabilitator before the maintenance staff here where I live found it. They might have killed it on the possibility of it being sick (and the known stupidity of our local kid population, several of whom set part of the high school down the street on fire getting in the mood for the 4th of July) and if it can be rehabbed and released I'd always prefer that! We need our bats! This little dude is no bigger than my thumb, two and a half or three inches in body length, and it probably eats nearly a thousand mosquitos EVERY NIGHT. Here in West Nile risk country, you can't ignore those numbers.

And the rehabbers seem to be fairly thrilled with me: to catch Mr. Bat, I put on soft leather gloves, coaxed him from his rafter perch outside onto a plastic clothes hanger, cuddled him close until I got him upstairs, then slid the glove he refused to let go of off my hand & into a tiny, well-vented stackbox I'd cleaned & filled with paper towels this morning (used to be a baby snake house). The fella who just picked him up says he'll bring the glove back later after they figure out how to get the bat out of it, because bats like to cuddle up to fuzzy things and he'd crawled inside to snuggle on the soft side of the buckskin-like thin leather. I sure hope the little critter makes it!

Ohhhh! I so hope he makes it, too! We love to sit out and watch the bat shows.

For me there have been several defining moments that involved touch.........

Swimming with the dolphins certainly is right up there

Holding a 3 toed sloth, Buttercup, in my arms while visiting a rescue center in Costa Rica

Holding a flying fox by its toes - these are the fruit bats in Australia

Boa constrictors and tarantulas in my classroom allowed those students who wished to overcome some fears to make some tactile connections with live creatures from the other side.

Wonderful thread.
Roufous Hummingbirds-had them using my finger as stool waiting in line for feeder at friends' house in N. Idaho (on the flyway for several species)
Holding a male Ruby Throat who had banged into the window. Kept him warm and safe until he could fly away.
Trumpeter swans that I fed (and called in their banding #'s) as they stopped on the way south. The Alpha male actually put wings around me and "hugged'..as I am 5' and a human..I think he was letting me know who was boss.
Bats..I have leather gloves handy to give them a ride if they get too tired when flying in the house and cannot be "herded" out. Doesn't happen often, but won't dispatch them and they don't always end up in the room with a door and lights so that I can "light" their way out.
snakeadelic..that was one Tiny bat.
Baby Gray squirrel--out of nest..not really mature enough to get out of yard with the dogs and didn't have a clue when I tried to hoist him back on the tree. He became attached to me in only a bit of time..even with gloves on. He fell asleep in my hands as I drove him off to rehab to get warm room and food. Worrisome on how easily they bond.
Monarch butterfly on my shoulder for a second., firely also for a few seconds.

I forgot about my short time at the Olympia Wildlife Rescue Center (which no longer exists).

Carrying and feeding a full sized beaver
Bottle feeding (and touching) fawns
Patting the rump of a Roosevelt elk
Feeding baby barn owls
Feeding bats

As a volunteer for a salmon enhancement program:

We got to hand catch and release spawning coho from the fish trap, so that we could get a number and sex of those going up stream. It was SO exciting for me that I kept squealing like a six year old each time I hoisted one of the BIG salmon!

Raising a Douglas squirrel, a flying squirrel, and a raccoon in the house.....those are no longer considered OK, but at the time, I was stupid, no matter how well intentioned.

My most memorable touch experience was to touch my new born babies.
Those were the most joyful moments of my life.

I once touched a real black doll that sold in the twin cities area for the sum of $225,000.00 and there was a ten percent buyers premium on top of that. It was antique black bisque, German made for the French market, open mouthed, hand blown sleep eyes, pierced ears with pear ear rings, mohair wig and all original clothes, one of a kind, in absolute mint condition. The buyer bought it for his wife's 50th. wedding anniversary present. This was and I believe remains the highest price ever paid for a doll.

wannadance-envy you feeding the natures' littles. (and the bigger ones too)
snakeadelic-ah, the diamond and the wildlife. I had wanted to muck through the Arkansas mine to find a 99million carat one, but not on my to do list now. Sigh.