My Ring / Love Story

For one of my early teen birthdays, Aunt Joan gave me a ring that had been in her family for years. It had an emerald stone, and I treasured it. But, being a tomboy, I wore it while playing baseball. I can still see the stone flying off into the grass as the bat hit the ball and the vibration loosened the stone enough to separate it from its setting. My brothers and the neighbor boys all helped me look, even though they were boys, because they could see how much it meant to me. Our search was in vain and I had to return home with a hole in my heart ring, and my heart.

Mom, seeing my genuine feelings of loss, did not scold me. Instead, for my next Birthday, she replaced the missing stone with my birthstone, making it even more. I wore it for years, and then...

Gave it to my Goddaughter, Kristen, when I got married... I retrieved it, about 15 years later, along with some other parts of the self I'd “lost" while being married, and realized that ring means more to me than my wedding band ever did. We eloped on Aug 16th 1991, when “it made sense” to do so. We were moving away from my hometown and his 16 year old daughter was living with us. So, we exchanged vows under a tree at the town hall. A few months later, we purchased wedding rings at the mall and exchanged them outside a coffee shop. I suppose there was some romance in there somewhere. We still had the “scheduled” wedding the following May, and that was when I gave Kristen my favorite ring. Years later, I saw it at my parent's house, left behind when Kristen moved out. Mom said she never wore it, so I reclaimed it and it was in my jewelry box, waiting when I pawned the wedding band and purchase a costume for our kid with the cash.

I don't wear it very often, or the aquamarine one Mom gave us in 2004 to celebrate March birthdays. Delicate, silver setting with the light blue stone, it is about as opposite a ring as gold and dark red could get, but for me it carries the same meaning. To thine own self be true. Marry yourself, and the rest will fall into place.

“In the midst of our lives, we must find the magic that makes our souls soar” ~ Evelyn Beilenson