I have two lovely rings. – Wendi Rank
Well, I used to have three. But one day while cleaning, I noticed the diamond
had disappeared from my engagement ring.
Gutted — and a bit distressed — I told my husband. He offered to work some overtime to replace the diamond. “Eh,” I said. I’d rather have new carpets.” Which was maybe not the thing to say. In one sentence, I managed to malign both my engagement ring and our carpeting. I wish I could say that takes skill. It doesn’t. It just takes prolonged dissatisfaction with a carpet you accidentally melted and set fire to — in two separate incidents — years before.
The damage was minimal. Only I noticed it. Every single day. I was organizing my bedroom closet when I noticed the missing diamond. I shook out all the shoes. Then I emptied the vacuum’s canister and vacuumed the closet. But no diamond swirled into the empty plastic of the vacuum’s canister. So I was down to two rings – my wedding ring and my diamond ring.
I know, I know. What’s up with the diamond ring? I think you should prepare yourself. Prepare yourself to feel very, very sorry for me. Because diamonds are my birthstone. Yeah. I had a ring with two diamond chips, a gift the Christmas I was twelve. And I had diamond stud earrings, a sweet sixteen birthday gift.
Years ago, I asked my parents – providers of my various diamonds – to take all of my diamonds and combine them into one ring. That’s just fun to say. All of my diamonds. So they did. All my diamonds combined into a keepsake ring I’ll pass to my daughter someday. But when I sat in the emergency room in November, the staff suggested I remove my wedding ring before my broken wrist swelled my fingers into sausages.
Had it been my right hand, I would have given my diamond ring to my daughter that day. But to remove my wedding ring – I don’t know. It bugged me. Maybe I’m overthinking this, but I’m a Natural Born Killers kind of girl – the ring stays on no matter what. I mean, I’m not a killing spree Natural Born Killers kind of a girl. Just a Natural Born Killers theory on wedding rings kind of girl.
I risked the swelling, leaving my wedding ring right where it’s been since the day my husband slipped it on my finger. Well, except for that year I was mysteriously allergic to all jewelry. So maybe not so much with the Natural Born Killers.
But ten days after that fracture, I sat in a surgical center, waiting for the injections and fluids that would put me to sleep while that fracture was repaired. “Both rings will have to come off,” the staff told me. Which was funny because by then, my fingers had swollen into little sausages. I may not adhere too well to Natural Born Killers, but my wedding ring certainly does – it could not be budged. My surgeon – with the skill, I’d imagine, you’d want in a surgeon – was able to slip my wedding ring off.
It’s been two months now. That swelling took its good ol’ time dissipating, but my fingers have reverted to their non-sausage state. And now – now I’ve gotten used to my bare fingers. I mean, I can’t tell left from right without my rings to guide me, but I’ve otherwise grown used to life without them. Do I leave them off? Leave them off for now? Pass that ring to my daughter? Set fire to the carpet again? Well. Only if I decide to embrace Natural Born Killers.
Contact Wendi Rank on Instagram @wendirank
