If I were a beautiful diamond ring, where would I be?

by Julie Meyers Pron on January 3, 2010 · 15 comments

Apparently this is rare, but I take off my engagement ring. Often. I don’t bathe with it. I don’t shower with it. I never go to the beach. And I never sleep with it.

I have a standard few places in my house where I keep my ring. In the kitchen, for when I take it off to wash dishes, I have a tiny limoge box on the window sill. In my bathroom, I place it on a washcloth between my sink and my husband’s. And in the kids’ bathroom there’s a tiny shelf and it goes toward the back, above where little fingers may find it.

But on a rushed day, fitting in a quick bath for Little, I speedily took off my engagement ring and placed it, conveniently, down, while Big casually caught up on the latest episode of Signing Time. Little’s bath lasted about 5 minutes, I dressed her, and we ran out the door to pick up Middle at a playdate. The ring, so I thought, remained down.

So when I returned home that afternoon I briefly looked for my ring at the place where I was fairly certain I placed it and it wasn’t there. Not a terribly big deal, I could have remembered the wrong placement. So I checked all the regular places. And the ring was gone.

The next day I started searching, quite a bit more frantically. My ring was gone. Crying, sweating, I finally gathered the nerve to tell my husband, who walked me through the past few days. We questioned the kids. Several times. Sometimes with frustration, other times casually, we surveyed their knowledge about Mommy’s very important ring. Big denied any such knowledge. Middle shook his head.

Our family pictures were scheduled the next day. The huz and I searched every trash can. My neighbor came by to help in the search. We emptied the trash bags in the garage. We checked every pipe drain we could access. (I even learned how to clean the pipes.) We tore the house apart, put it back together and cleaned all over again. The ring was still gone.

Sunday morning we primped, prepped and left for pictures without my beautiful, 10-year-old engagement ring. I had that ring nearly 10 years to the day. And we were meeting for the first time with a professional photographer since our wedding without my ring.

That night as I kissed middle good night, thinking if anyone moved the ring he would have, I asked him if he had seen the ring anywhere. “No,” he replied, “and I don’t think Big did either. But if he did, he might still know where it is now.” Hmmm…

The following morning was rushed and it wasn’t until afternoon that I had a few quiet minutes with Big. While I had asked him several times before that Monday, I asked him, again, but differently. “Big, if my ring just magically showed up, you know I wouldn’t be mad. At all. I might not even ask where it was. I’d just be so happy to wear it back on my finger.”

Not one minute later Big was back by my side, ring in hand, beautiful, excited smile splashed across his face. He was so proud as he announced “Mommy! I can’t believe it! I found your ring!”

I picked him up, spun him around, and celebrated. And then I asked, casually, where he found it? He took my hand, proudly led me to his bedroom and pointed to the middle shelf of his bookshelf. The same bookshelf that we checked time and again.

I’ll never know where the ring was, I promised I wouldn’t ask. But I certainly know where it is now.

This post was written in response to Beth Feldman’s See Mom Run: Side Splitting Essays from the World’s Most Harried Moms, the SVMom’s Blog Book Club selection. Beth gave me my copy, and my mom wrote an essay which was published in the book.

About Julie Meyers Pron

Julie Meyers Pron has written 810 post in this blog.

mom of 3 and wife, Julie is a former elementary school teacher and a Public Relations manager. She is the owner/editor of Just Precious, founding partner of Just Centsible, and a team member of Splash Creative Media. Julie is a PTOer, volunteer, elementary educator and that's just the beginning of the list!