Now that I’ve finished the story I’ll say, most of this is true. I only lied a little bit. I hope that doesn’t matter.
I’ll speak for all of us and reassure
that we don’t mind. In fact, we understand that the storytellers art- whether it be in the form of a written story or after dinner raconteurship- necessitates a little bit of fibbing, of embellishment and fusing together of timelines and characters. It’s all part of the art.But Jeanne knows this already, clearly. You don’t get to be this good at telling a story without knowing the rules of the game. It’s just not possible.
Enjoy.
TJB.
Have you ever lost something dear? Did you find it again?
This is a story about a lost ring. Might be a little more. I never know when I start writing how it will turn out.
Once upon a time. You have to start that way, if you want a happy ending. If it’s a scary story you start with something like; In a deep dark forest there dwelled. Maybe you want a lot of clicks? Then you start with something like; 7 ways to find what you’ve lost, number 3 will surprise you!.
What do you write when you don’t know the ending?
When I was a young girl, a tiny thing, so small and tender that I did not yet know I existed, my grandfather bought me a diamond ring. A lovely child’s ring with a small diamond set in white gold. It was a unique setting. A thin round band that split into two flattened sections at the to top. The diamond was enveloped in the silvery gold arms of the ring, completely secured. My mother held the ring between her fingers and wiggled it back and forth in front of my chubby widdle cheeks so that I could get a good look.
“Look what Pop Pop bought you! Look, my widdle iddle sweetie poo, it’s sooo pwetty. Doesn’t ou wuv it? Doesn’t ou now?” She was right. It was enticing.
Naturally, I made a quick grab and tried to eat it.
My mother put the ring away after that until I was older. Once or twice I was allowed to wear it for singular occasions. It was made to fit a child’s hand, but it never fit mine. It was either “too big I’m afraid you’ll lose it” or “too small, I don’t want it to get stuck.” It finally became “I’ll put it away safely till you’re old enough to be responsible.” Still I longed to have the ring. My mother told me that diamonds were precious gems. She told me that meant that they were hard to find so everyone wanted one. I didn’t question this. I liked the idea of owning a real diamond. It made me feel rare and special. None of my friends had rings of any sort.
I turned 14 shortly after my father died. On my birthday at bedtime she brought the brushed velvet ring box into my room and placed it on the table beside my bed.
“You’re big enough now. Here’s your ring. Don’t lose it.” was all she said.
My mother was on the quiet side before Dad died. When he was alive. It was always, “What would your father say?” or “You’d better not let your father see you do that!” or “Wait till your father gets home young lady.” Without him there she simply had nothing to say. A widow with four children and no job, she was lost. It was the best she could do, I suppose, but I needed more.
At that moment I sensed I was on my own. It wasn’t something I remember thinking specifically, but I knew it was true. Fully grown, I needed to be able to take care of myself. I needed to be responsible. I took over my father’s duties. I learned how to unclog sinks. I killed spiders. I mowed the grass with one of those rotary push mowers until a neighbor boy felt sorry for me and took over. I trimmed the hedges. (He didn’t feel that sympathetic.) I tarred the driveway and the flat part of the roof. My mother got a job teaching and went back to school to get her masters. She was gone most of the time, so someone had to cook. I did that because whoever cooked didn’t have to do dishes. My older sister did the dishes and kept the kitchen tidy. My younger sister learned magic. She could disappear in an instant whenever there was work to be done.
The ring still didn’t fit. The darn thing was a little bit too big for my pinkie and too small for my ring finger. I wore it on my pinkie anyway. Every day I put it on in the morning. I kept it in it’s box at night because it slid off into the covers when I tossed and turned. It was that kind of poor fit. It wouldn’t fall off on it’s own. There had to be an outside force. I was careful. I didn’t want to lose it. Though it was only an object, it was my object. The hardest substance on earth, it could last forever.
It didn’t last forever. Two years later I lost it.
By then my fingers were a little thicker. I started to feel comfortable wearing the ring. I wore it everywhere, day and night. My confidence made me carefree. When you wear something like a ring or a watch all the time, you only miss it when it’s gone. You don’t think about it until you touch where it was and it isn’t there. It hits you suddenly and you have a brief sense of panic until you remember where you last had it or you find it again.
I remembered where I lost it almost at once. There was no mystery to it at all. It was gone forever, of that I was certain.
It was hot for a June day. After the summer school American History class finished up, I snagged a ride home with Gregg. We had met a few weeks earlier. I noticed him the very first day and luckily he noticed me. We were instant friends. To this day I have never met a man I found more attractive. I’ve never met a man I could speak to more honestly. I’ve never met a happier man. It was like I was looking in a mirror, I felt so natural with him. I knew instantly what I wanted and for a short time , we had it. It was rare and special. I was enchanted. We headed to the gravel pit, well hidden from public view, for a swim.
Of course we hadn’t brought our swimsuits to school with us. We would skinny dip. Unlike any other boy on the planet, I had no inhibitions with Gregg. To this day I cannot explain my behavior around him. It is as if I had always known him. He deftly ran down the steep bank into the cool water. Since it was so steep, I edged my way down slowly using my hands to steady myself as I went. Much more at ease in the water, I swam confidently to where he stood. It was sweltering. The sun shone so brightly I couldn’t see his face clearly only his slightly crooked grin. His back lit hair glowed. Droplets of cool water sparkled across his chest and on his arms tiny hairs stood up from the chill of the water. His golden skin shone silver as he wraped his arms around me. Like my diamond, I was secure.
Later that afternoon he dropped me off at the corner by my house. I ran upstairs to shower before my mom noticed that my hair was wet and started asking questions. She was concerned what her friends would think if they saw me with “that long haired boy”. It was easier to evade than confront. She relinquished her authority when my father died and her appeals to control me by shame fell on deaf ears.
As I laid down for a short nap my thumb moved habitually to adjust the ring. It was gone. Sunk to the bottom of the muddy pool. I had been thoughtless. I had been too happy.
I finally got up the courage to tell my mother it was lost a few days later. She asked me to review where I had been. I didn’t want to tell her it was gone for good. I didn’t want to tell her I was skinny dipping with Gregg. I pretended I might have lost it while trimming the hedges. I pretend searched those bushes from top to bottom. I found an abandoned bunnies nest but no diamond ring. She kept needling me. I told her I’d gone to a friend’s house with some other girls.
“What friend?” of course she would ask that. I would have.
“Gregg.” Why I couldn’t smoothly make up a another name I will never know. If you know me, you know my face gives everything away when I lie. My mother knew me.
“Is that the long haired boy I told you to stay away from?”. She knew damn well it was. She never once said his name. I was furious. I was cowed.
“What’s his father’s name?” She continued. Back then people’s phone numbers were listed by the father’s name. “I’ll call his mother and ask her to search for the ring.”
“I can do that.” I jumped in instantly. Gregg’s father had died the same year as mine, I wasn’t sure of his father’s name. I wasn’t going to let my mother’s distaste infect his unsuspecting mother. With my Mom hovering over me, I dialed his number. His mother answered. I had never met her. Awkwardly I told her my name, she recognized it. She seemed kind. I explained that I thought I’d lost my ring. I asked her to look for it. That moment, my deception, my selfishness in asking an unsuspecting woman, the mother of my favorite person, to look for something I knew wasn’t there felt ugly. I felt ugly. The magic spell was broken.
Of course she didn’t find it. She called back to tell me she had done a careful search but sorry, no ring.
My ring was lost. I was a liar. Of course everyone is a liar and if they say they aren’t, then they are a big ass liar. I didn’t feel bad about lying to my mother. Sadly I was only important to her if I did things that would make her friends proud. I had been acting of my own accord too long for that to matter. But lying to Gregg’s mother was the same as lying to Gregg. Maybe worse.
I was hesitant to visit his house after that, afraid I’d see his Mom. When we went out I began to notice that other girls were interested in him. I assumed he would be interested in them. I wasn’t ready or able to be serious. Up until then I had reveled in the ease we had with each other. But I ruined it. Feeling the fault in myself I starting looking for flaws in him. I started noticing other boys were interested in me too. Maybe he would be happier with someone who wasn’t like me. As special as he was to me, having lied once, I lied to him again. I lied to myself. One day, with no harsh words, I told him I didn’t or couldn’t care. I don’t remember exactly what I said because it wasn’t true. Lies are harder to remember than the truth. It was easier to push him away than to love and lose. I was too young for love. I was too lost to lose. I walked away. I didn’t look back. It was the end of the summer. There was no ring. There was no Gregg. I only had one more year of high school and then there would be no Mom. That last year passed quickly. I barely remember it. Nothing was rare or special.
The next summer my best friend moved back to town. It was a hot day in August, almost time for me go away to college. We were just lolling around on her front porch. Lolling around is what kids did when they had some free time back then. It was mostly sitting, sometimes poking stuff with sticks, sometimes picking up pieces of grass and tearing them up slowly. Mostly quiet until you got an idea for for action.
“Bike downtown?” I suggested.
“No, too hot! Movie?” she countered.
“Seen em all”
“Pool?”
“Nah, too crowded. I know, let’s go skinny dipping. Ever done that?” I had remembered the gravel pit, the one I couldn’t forget.
“I could never do that. What if we get caught?”
“Don’t worry, I assured her. “I know the perfect place.”
My friend was nimble, just like Gregg she easily jogged down the bank and into the water. I was not as sure footed. Suddenly, as I scooched down and put my hands into the loose dirt on the bank to steady myself, I had a thought. What if my ring didn’t fall off in the water? As soon as this occured to me, I looked down and at the side of the steep path, I saw what looked like a pull-off beer tab stuck into the bank.
Cigarette butts and beer tabs littered the bank, but for some reason I took a closer look. Something wasn’t quite right, the top of this tab was buried in the soil. Only about three quarters of the ring part was showing. It was thicker than aluminum, shinier too. Surely it’s trash, my sensible side told me. I didn’t listen because my heart was screaming, it’s your ring! I pulled the partially buried beer tab out from under the dirt. My heart was right. IT WAS MY RING. The top of the mount and the diamond had been hidden for over a year. Everyone who passed it, if they even noticed, thought it was worthless.
I didn’t tell my mother I’d found it, not right away. I waited till the hedges needed trimmed again and pretended to find it in the bushes.
Like my ring, I never quite fit during those years. I grew up too fast. The death of my father shattered my confidence. It shattered me. My mother was caught unprepared. I had been sheltered like my diamond in a beautiful setting. I thought it would last forever. It didn’t. It changed me. I moved away from home and out on my own that fall. I wasn’t yet seventeen. As happy as I was to find the ring again, I no longer wanted to wear it. I put it safely away in it’s box. There it stayed as a memento of love and loss. Last May I gave it to my oldest granddaughter. Her mother, my daughter, put it away for her until she is older.
Now that I’ve finished the story I’ll say, most of this is true. I only lied a little bit. I hope that doesn’t matter. I hope my granddaughter loves the ring and never loses it. I hope she always feels loved and secure. She is rare and special. May she live happily ever after.
❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️
This is everything. The childhood and youth, and all those items and things that were too precious to use now. Save them for later things. And Gregg. May everyone have a Gregg in their youth!
"The sun shone so brightly I couldn’t see his face clearly only his slightly crooked grin. His back lit hair glowed. Droplets of cool water sparkled across his chest and on his arms tiny hairs stood up from the chill of the water. His golden skin shone silver as he wraped his arms around me. Like my diamond, I was secure." This is the perfection of teenage love.
And -- to find what is most precious too late. Gosh, it stings. It stings in such a recognizable way! Jeanne, this is a movie that you've written!