Momma's Magical Green Ring

His name was Bill, but since we are in the south we can call him 'Beeeeyawl.'
He was a buyer and a stranger and I brought him into my home.
He walked from room to room, opening cupboards, boxes, cabinets and drawers... pulling out things he wanted to take.
He found a box of antique and vintage costume jewelry...none of which I had even worn.
I plucked one ring out...'I gotta keep this one. It's magical. And it's from my Momma.'
Swooping in onto my pointer finger, I held my hand out to view.
Beeeyawl looked at me, then the ring, gathering all the others...'What makes it magical?'
'Well, just look at it! It's seaweed green, sunlight in the forest green! In fact, the only thing that keeps me from being a mermaid walking the earth or a woodland fairie trapped for the moment in suburbia is... your imagination.'
'That is the craziest thing I have ever heard.'
'Then either you haven't heard enough or you are not a very good listener. Yeah, you will have to stick around longer.'

I wore the twisted, knotted and broken green ring for the rest of the day.
... a hopeless believer...

Rings of Circles & Circles of Rings...

Rings.
Stones.
Circles.
Rocks.

I have only had a couple/few rings in my life made of gold or platinum, with or without precious or semi-precious stones.

My sister gave me a ring some twenty plus years ago made of gold.
Never seen anything like it.
Ornate & old looking, I am sure, from the day it was made.
A tiny little sapphire surrounded by a small square which was cornered in hearts, surrounded by a small rectangle and more hearts....all enclosed by more hearts & boxes.
One sapphire, repeated four corners & thirteen hearts in all.
I wore it daily until I broke it, collapsing one corner of the heart shaped filigree.
Three jewelers have told me that they would not repair it.
So I keep it in a special little cardboard box I got on my eighteenth birthday.

My engagement ring was made of gold & platinum.
It has a small little round diamond with clarity much better than my own and an ornate squared setting. Ironically enough, just before I asked for divorce, the platinum setting popped on one side, separating itself from the band. A circle wide open. It now lays folded in some tissue & stuffed into an envelope in an unfrequented drawer.

My mother gave me an antique platinum band with three small diamonds in a beautiful setting. I have worn it faithfully for years until last week. The jeweler told me 'You can't break platinum.'
I reached in my pocket, pulled out a folded & torn corner of an envelope & passed it to him...'Well, I'll be damned.' In it lay the platinum band from my mother. He referred me to another jeweler...and I dropped it back into the paper pouch.

Before going home, I stopped by a vintage shop. There I saw a little sign.
It read.... 'The things that matter the most in life aren't things at all.'

Profoundly true.
I pulled on the Joe-made peace sign that hangs by leather from my neck.
I looked down at the little leather band that now sat solo around my finger.
I rubbed the jade that the leather held.
I thought of the good health that the jade represents.

I thought of my brothers, my sisters, my life & mortality...
Everything means something...

and I remembered that those rings may be broken,
but the circle is not...

(image is of jade, silver & leather ring made by awesome spirit at earthlypossessions)