Jewelry

Jewelry

“We find, as in old jewelry, the gone days of our lives.” – Colum McCann from Let the Great World Spin

Given by a doting, childless aunt, an expectant mother, an apprehensive father, a thoughtful friend, given in a party favor by someone half-remembered, found, stolen, given by the dead, borrowed but not returned.

The days and nights you wore it. Weddings. Christmases. Formal school dances. Not so formal school dances.

The shopkeeper who sold it to you.

The hours searching for the perfect matching pearl earrings to fulfill a mislead dream.

Staring at the cold, shining metal on your mother’s warm skin. The thought that one day you will be a woman too.

Parties. The way your earrings swing and brush against your neck, through your tangled hair as you dance. The jingle of bangles on a high held wrist, not quite in rhythm with the heavy modern music. The way you tug on your ‘D’ letter necklace, once your grandmother’s now yours. But as you shy away from his eyes you aren’t thinking of your grandmother.

Summer vacations. Wearing shells and hemp. Ankle bracelets soaking in salty water.

The cheap, the rare, the ugly, the ones too beautiful and precious to wear. You might lose them. It is possible but what is certain is that the days of gone are gone but not lost.