The Jewelers

I contemplated flinging the ring over the railing into the woods, but then I thought: no, then it will be down there. The diamond will be shining in the dirt like the highlight on an eye in a painting, watching me. It will bother me that it’s still close by. 

I stood on the front porch and held my wedding ring in my hand, shaking it like dice. My eyes had been dry of tears for days, and I felt my fingers start to loosen. But, I reasoned, why not just separate yourself from it, think of it as a Thing?  

It had no emotional value anymore, it was an ounce of gold more or less. Sell it. Let it return to the world and find a new home. That would serve my sense of economy, but it would also benefit my karma. Let things flow to the positive, and let that come back to me. 

***

There had never been a proposal scene—Will falling to one knee, tiny box in hand.  I had gone to live with him in Syracuse, New York, and we decided to become officially engaged.

We drove to a local jewelry store, a mom-and-pop storefront set between a dry-cleaners and a Subway Sandwich shop.   One of those pockets of glitter with wedding diamonds and birthstone necklaces that show up sometimes in a drab strip mall.  Sterling silver charms, clocks, and Spode china in the black-barred window.

I hadn’t been sure I wanted an engagement ring, the symbolism of it (only for women, an off-limits sign?) or the bling. Neither of those things were “me,” but I acquiesced to tradition.   The owner, an old upstate New Yorker almost ready to retire, skinny with a beer paunch, asked about my size.  

“I don’t know,” I said.  He wore a magnifying loupe on a chain around his neck.  “Let’s see where you land,” he said, and I handed him my high school ring, the one currently on my left-hand fourth finger. He dropped it on to a graduated stick.  Size 8, same as my shoes.  How about that.

I tried some rings on.  Prettily extended my arm to my future husband. Dropped my wrist so he could examine the square cut, the marquise cut, the white gold versus the yellow gold. I felt like a queen waiting for a subject to take her fingers and offer homage.   

There were three bands in the set we chose– two wedding rings and the engagement ring. 

“That pattern is called “Love Knot. Like you kids are doing, tying the knot.” The jeweler smiled his grandfatherly smile.  He was wearing a short-sleeved white shirt and polyester slacks. I liked that he didn’t seem attached to the sale.  No used car dealer, he. “Looks really good on you.  Classic,” he said.  

“That’s the one. Love Knot.” Will nodded in agreement.  Oh the irony though, years later, of that silent K.  The ring looked like a little chain around my finger. I loved the simplicity of it, and there was just a tiny diamond, barely a quarter of a karat.  Will tried his ring on too-- the matching, but heavier masculine version, of mine.  Then he took it off. Saving it, of course, for the ceremony. 

We bought them on a payment plan, like people do when they buy a refrigerator. After we were married, I handled all the finances.  By our first anniversary, they were paid for.

I never took mine off unless I needed to clean them.  With the open spaces in the chain, little bits of soap residue and dirt accumulated.  I had a special toothbrush for it, used baking soda. 

 Over the years, breaks occasionally developed in the chain.  You couldn’t even tell they were there, but the skin of my finger would get caught in the split, it pinched, so I had to take it in and get it welded with 24K gold.  Eventually I got the two rings welded together to strengthen them, and it also kept the diamond aligned on the top of my hand. 

Once one of the prongs holding the diamond broke and the stone fell out. I didn’t even know it had happened until my hand brushed my daughter’s arm and she complained: “Ow, Mom, your ring scratched me.”  For three days, I looked for the diamond.  I had given up the search, resigned myself to the loss, but then I was getting ready to put in a load of laundry and something iridescent glinted on the rug in front of the washer.  It seemed infinitesimal, barely more than a speck on the floor.  “Oooh, no way,” I gasped, and picked it up, it was basically a piece of clear grit.  I retrieved a magnifying glass and studied it, appreciating the facets, the shape. Everything saved and repaired that time.

Will’s ring had also suffered some breaks, had some mends.  He did most of the yardwork, played baseball, and that stressed the ring. Finally, it just broke into three pieces.

By this point, we’d been married for 20 years. He went for about six months without it, then we took it to a jeweler in Asheville, North Carolina, an artisan who did custom work and made one-of-a-kind pieces.  His shop was in the historic part of downtown.  The building had its original puncheon floors and tin tiles on the ceiling. Jewelry displays were accented with local pottery; large serving bowls and teapots had their own pedestals, like at a museum.  In the background a CD played some Celtic instrumentals.  I heard the soft zing, zing, of a dulcimer as we talked.

“This has so much damage,” the craftsman, Chris, said, looking at the pieces. He wore a wool vest accented with a watch chain and fob, and stood behind his counter, an antique which had been salvaged from a country general store.  “I’d like to propose I carve a new one for you.  It will look like the old one, only chunkier, and stronger.  I can melt down this gold to do it, and I guarantee it won’t break.” 

“Sounds like a good idea,” Will said.  “Just what I need.”  We chatted on with Chris about the pottery in his store, about the aesthetic of his work. “Nice to make your acquaintance,” he said as we left, and held up his hand.  He was a friend of ours, now.   

Three weeks later, the ring was ready.  When Will came in the house, he took his hand out from behind his back and slammed it down flat on the kitchen counter. “Ta-da!” he said.  His arm was stretched out in his jacket sleeve and the new ring was on his finger.

“I see,” I said.  “Wow.  I love it.”  We grinned at each other. “Me too,” he said.  Simultaneously we leaned across the kitchen island and kissed.

By the time, years later, when our life had upended and divorce was daily on my mind, he’d been wearing it and wearing it.  He was still fragile and in recovery from his psychotic break, the one where his secret life of infidelity had spilled out.  He had improved enough to be able to drive, make his own food, schedule an appointment with the barber.  He was taking his medication without being forced to, and was going to his therapy and psychiatry appointments.   I knew we were going to separate and he was leaving for his new apartment soon, so I spoke up. “Take it off,” I said. 

“My ring,” he said.  “I love my ring. I don’t want to take it off.” His mouth turned down.

I didn’t have time to dwell in my astonishment, how he had been able to simultaneously love his ring and disrespect everything it stood for. “I’m not your wife now, only legally,” I said.  I’d never felt more blunt, and seeing it on his hand I felt my lip curl in distaste. I could barely keep myself from yanking it off, only I didn’t want to touch him.  All he had told me as his mind broke was still with me. The porn films were barely corralled in my head, like things visible behind a piece of tape at a crime scene.  

“You don’t have a right to wear it, you don’t have my permission.  Leave it here.” I pointed to a dish on the kitchen desk where we kept odds and ends.  Keys and coins.  An acorn off the oak tree out back.  Random buttons and paper clips. 

After he left the house, I moved it.  I didn’t want to have to keep looking at it.  I put it in a tiny plastic bag and placed it in his dresser drawer that was mostly empty now, just a few pairs of his old socks and some T-shirts. I would deal with it later.

 My own ring had been off for months already.  The base of my left ring finger was still constricted though, and whiter.  The wedding ring was gone, but it had left a negative shadow. Shape of a woman on the concrete after she’d been incinerated by the nuclear flash. 

I didn’t want to keep it, but would one of my daughters want it?  I didn’t think so, not now, under these circumstances.  I had an Etsy store, I could sell it there, but that was an enterprise of love to me.  It reflected my creativity; it was my “quality of life” endeavor with its own bank account.  With money from it, I had financed a trip to Ireland for myself and my two daughters, among other things. 

So Ebay, then.  That would make it more transactional.   I used the account to sell electronics, a purse I bought but never used, a book my mother asked me to list for her. There was no personality, no emotion to this account, it couldn’t even qualify as a “store” the way my Etsy listings did.  I retrieved the Love Knot and took it outside to photograph it.  Placed it on the porch railing where it caught spears of light from the setting sun coming through the trees. I took a close up of the imprint “Keepsake 24K” on the inside of the band. I mused how I had stood just here, weighing it, ready to pitch it, so recently. 

 After I finished, I took it inside to my computer and listed it for a starting bid of $100.  I didn’t care about the outcome, about whether it achieved even its scrap value. A week later, I got a notification that the ring had sold.  $183.00.  Fine.  I packed it up, added insurance for $200 to the postage. 

 I wanted to feel happier by having let it go.   I sensed the set of my mouth, the way you do when you feel something but you aren’t letting it rise to the surface. My grief, my loss, all those years. It’s hard work, releasing.

 I received a note via ebay within a few days.  It was from the new owner.  He lived on a reservation in New Mexico.  “I love the ring,” he said.  “It’s perfect, and so beautiful.  Thank you so much.  I could never have afforded anything new retail.  I’m going to propose to my fiancée soon.”  

 As I read his words, I felt a channel open in my sadness.  I sensed something like a possibility gleaming in the distance. I breathed in, breathed out.  Maybe this was how it felt to be a jeweler.  A go-between, purveyor of hope, love, and wedding rings.  Fingers bare, my karma account grew then.  Currency, perhaps, of a different sort. 

-Catherine Vance

As May and June are typically wedding season, Catherine wanted to submit this piece about how she sold her wedding ring on ebay when her marriage ended. We all have to find ways to live to the positive, and as difficult as it was, Catherine believes she did just that. Catherine lives in Houston Texas, where she writes and does social justice volunteering. Catherine holds an MFA from Washington University in St. Louis and was a recipient of the Dobie-Paisano Award from the Texas Institute of Letters. Her recent work has appeared in Synkroniciti, Defunkt, Write Launch, Talking Writing, Visible Magazine, Sad Girls Club, and Wraparound South.