wearing the ring
THE ENGAGEMENT RING
My grandmother Dickerson was engaged when she met my grandfather. Actually my biological grandfather was long gone and it was my step grandfather who stole Geneva’s heart from another man. So what do you do with the engagement ring in such a case?
I can’t say whose idea it was. I just remember reaching up to the counter in a jewelry store to have my finger measured. The diamond was too small to be of much value. But it was in a pretty setting and I was one proud preschooler sporting that ring. As I grew, more visits to more counters where a jeweler slipped rings on my finger until my parents decided this size was a good next step up.
That ring sat on the ring finger of my right hand right into adulthood. Somewhere, somehow, some-when, I lost it. Then Laura returned from a visit to her paternal grandmother, and she had something for me - a ring I had left beside the sink at my ex-mother-in-law’s house 14 years before. My grandparents lived across the road from us and I rushed over to show Grandma Dickerson. Looking at it and shaking her head, she said, “Honey, I don’t remember this ring.” My grandfather corroborated my story, but she still looked confused.
I don’t have Grandma Dickerson anymore, but I still have the ring that a long forgotten suitor placed on her hand I don’t know how many years ago. I don’t wear it often anymore. Mostly I put it on when I’m feeling vulnerable and need to borrow some of her courage and grit — when I need to feel a grandmother’s love.
