Ever since Bunny died, I’ve been
reluctant to wear my wedding and engagement rings. They were too painful a reminder that he was
gone. For the first few days, I tried
switching them to my right hand, but then they really were a constant reminder,
because I wasn’t accustomed to having them on that hand. I wore them for the memorial--which felt like
the right thing to do--and as I put them away, I realized that I was letting
perfectly good diamonds go to waste in a drawer.
I’m generally not wasteful by
nature, and my love of bling is legendary—plus, diamond is my birthstone! I
decided to convert my old rings into a new one.
I’d recently read about newly-divorced women melting down their old
rings and turning them into happy new ones. I decided to do the same. As an aside, my love of bling began, appropriately
enough, as a result of Aunt Ruth’s garage sale hauls. She would send us cocktail dresses and other fancy
attire, which we would put to use in our dress-up games.
My first, much-beloved cocktail
dress was a shiny, ice-blue satin number, with blue rhinestone buttons and
embellishments. I was about six when I
got it, so it was more like an evening gown on me. It was the prettiest thing I’d ever seen! My sisters and I called it the Lightnin’
Dress. For those of you who didn’t grow
up in the South, lightnin’ is the electrical atmospheric disturbance that often
accompanies thunder. And the insects you
catch in jars during summer nights aren’t fireflies, dammit—they’re Lightnin’
Bugs! From that point on, I wanted lightnin’ every
chance I could get it.
Back to the present: I found a
jeweler who was up to the task, so Trinity and I went over there today to bring
him my three rings and Bunny’s three rings to melt down and recast into a new
one, using my five diamonds. Let me
explain why we had six rings: I had a
thin, gold band and an oval solitaire to start, and Bunny had his first gold
band. Bunny’s first band was cut off him
during an emergency room visit for an asthma attack. We were in Atlanta at the time. He went ring-less for years after, until he
got ready to move to Florida. At that
point, he insisted I get another band for him.
“Why? You haven’t worn a ring for years.”
“Because you’re not going to be
down there with me, and I want all the other deauxs to know that I’m taken.” Aw!
He was so earnest, I didn’t have the heart to tease him. In hindsight, I realize he was anxious about
being alone, even for a little while.
That was Bunny’s ring #2, which
he lost in less than a year. I got ring
#3 and later found the second one.
During the trip to get #3, I got a ring wrap, with two diamonds on
either side, for my solitaire. This is
the whole trove of our combined marriage symbols (badly in need of cleaning):
I explained what I wanted done,
and why, and the jeweler showed us several different settings. I found one I really liked, then I had a
brainstorm.
“Let’s make my ring with the three
larger diamonds, and take the other two diamonds and make pendants for the two granddaughters.” Trinity really took an interest at that
point. The thought of dying didn’t bother Bunny so
much, but the thought that Sarita wouldn’t remember him did. He really identified with Sarita, and if he
had one regret, it was that he hadn’t gotten to spend as much time with her as
he had with Trinity.
The jeweler pulled out a book to
show Trinity the pendant styles, and she found one that we both really
liked. She pointed it out to him.
“That’s the rabbit-ear setting,” he said.
How perfect is that? Sold!
He made a sketch of my new ring,
then started taking my old ones apart to weigh and measure them. The solitaire was first. He took out the stone and examined it with
his loupe.
“Wow! This is a very high quality stone; one of the
best I’ve seen!” Then he put it on the
scale as I told him an abbreviated version of the story.
“Yes, he had it custom-made.” Bunny and I started dating in mid-June of
1985. Within two weeks, he asked me to
marry him. By November, he’d enlisted
one of his professors to make the ring.
This professor made jewelry as a hobby, and had access to wholesale
diamonds. I remember stopping by the
professor’s house so Bunny could pay for the stone. Bunny told me at the time that it was a very
high-grade stone. I got a really bad
vibe from the guy, but Bunny thought highly of him. As it turned out, I was right—he later went
to jail for perving on a girl.
Bunny’s plan was to give me the
ring on Thanksgiving weekend. I wouldn’t
know how or when, but that was the timeframe.
I woke up in pain Thanksgiving morning, ate very little of the dinner my
mother had prepared, got sick from what I did eat, and was undergoing emergency
surgery that night.
I really don’t remember the exact
moment he slipped the ring on my finger—I’d gotten so sick from the anesthesia
that I’d been up all night. Plus, the
nurses (who were my co-workers) made sure I wasn’t in pain. At some point, when I was fully conscious
and lucid, I realized that I was engaged.
It was a beautiful ring, but
everyone I tried to show it to had already seen it—Bunny had shown it around
before he’d given it to me! He’d even
shown it to my cousin’s fiance’, who was in one of his college classes. We were married on May 31, 1986.
Seeing the stone loose from its
setting brought all those memories flooding back. Fat, heavy tears flowed involuntarily down my
cheeks, splattering onto the glass case below me. Then I started thinking of Trinity and Sarita
wearing their pendants, maybe even on their own wedding days. What better way to begin a marriage than by wearing
a pendant made from jewelry that came from your grandparents’ happy marriage? OMG! Can you hear the violins yet?
The poor jeweler, seeing the
sudden storm brewing before him, looked genuinely distressed. He quickly brought me a roll of paper towels
(apparently jewelers don’t keep Kleenex at the ready), and consoled me on my
loss. I assured him I would be alright, and dried up
soon enough.
In a few weeks, I’ll have my new
lightnin’ ring. Just in time for my
anniversary.