ring

My mom gave me a diamond solitaire ring for Christmas. I’m still not used to how it feels on my hand, so I touch it a lot, adjusting it, shifting it left and right and straight up again. When I clap my hands in applause, it moves. When I type, it moves. It makes itself remembered with almost every movement of my hand. It’s like it’s the ring’s way of talking. But I don’t know what it’s trying to say.

My mom had this goal for years to give me this ring. She would say, “I’m going to get you a one-carat diamond ring someday.” I’d ask her why, and her response was always the same: “It’s the one thing I can leave you as a legacy.” It’s a long story of how I actually came to be wearing it, so I’ll leave that for another telling. For now, my point is that I don’t need, and indeed never wanted, a ring for a legacy. I appreciate and fully acknowledge her desire to leave something valuable and lasting as a tangible reminder of her life and love. But it is that very desire—that most intangible thing—that I crown as her legacy. It is her constant, consistent proffering of her love to me that is a gift no pile of money nor zeros before the decimal can touch.

A friend asked me about the ring yesterday, and it’s always with a touch of bittersweetness that I speak of it. I wish my mom could be convinced of her perdurable worth to me even if she were a penniless, wizened, old soul with no name. I don’t bring that up though. I just say it was a Christmas gift from my mom.

Just minutes after presenting the ring to me, she cautioned me to keep the paperwork in a safe place because when she saves up enough money again, she can give back this ring to the store in trade for a two-carat.

Oy.

right finger--wrong hand

Mom was like a child, sitting there neck deep in agitated excitement. She was finally in the moment she’d been working toward for years—she was giving me my ring. Dad wrapped it like he did another gift for me years ago: a box inside a box inside a box, ad infinitum. I finally got to the little white box at the creamy center and opened it. “Do you like it?” was her small but oh so interested query. I responded in kind, “It’s beautiful.”

I started to put it on the ring finger of my right hand, and she said, “It goes here,” and pointed to the left hand ring finger. “That’s my wedding finger.” She continued. “Yeah, that’s where it goes.” Instantly uncomfortable, I slipped off my wedding ring and put on the new guy. I put my wedding ring back on after it. It looked stupid, awkward, unpleasant. Wait—that’s how I felt. It really did look dumb though, like picturing Queen Elizabeth in a gorilla suit—some things are just wrong. The alternative was to wear this ring instead of the other one. That is just not an option though. I had to explain as gently as possible that this was my wedding ring, and I couldn’t not wear Kevin’s ring. This finger is for his ring, my ring, our ring.

The fact that it fit that digit and not the other one was a problem because she’d had it sized down just for that finger. She was deflated. “I’m sorry you’re disappointed. I messed it up. I never get anything right…” Oh no, she’s going there. Mom, please don’t go there. Just took another half hour of being optimistic and extremely pleasant and verbose about my gratitude, and we were back on track. I’ll just take it back and get it sized back up. Just make sure to go to the same saleslady “because the rest of them there are back stabbers. Make sure you go to Marjorie, nobody else.”

Wouldn’t you know it—Marjorie’s not working that day I find out when I stop on my way home. Maybe I can come back next week. Or the next. Or the next after that. After two weeks instead of the four days she said it would take, I call to see if it’s in. No, not in. I get a call from Marjorie much later, and she explains that she wrote down my phone number wrong and had to call Mom to get it. Bummer, now Mom knows it’s taken this long… She never commented though, come to think of it.

Almost a month after the day she gave it to me, I can finally wear this ring. Every glimpse of it reminds me of her tremendous love for me. Your heart’s always in the right place, my Mom. And now my ring is, too. Thank you from the bottom of my soul. XO