If you could look through your screen and see what is behind me, and over to my left (your right) you’d be shocked that I am such an untidy person. You’d be right. We cleaned out our kneewall over a month ago and I still have boxes that I need to go through before deciding what to do with the items within. I also recently returned from my mom’s house and brought boxes, suitcases, bags and briefcases full of stuff. I don’t think I have time to even go through everything, much less blog about the more interesting items.
Okay, I will let you see part of the mess. Just don’t judge me too harshly…
The big suitcase is filled with correspondence from Jeremy and other memories of my teenage years. The two bags hold childhood books, photographs, letters and other bits of nostalgia (oh, yeah and one or two toothbrushes — mom had about 50 extra toothbrushes).
The other day I was checking out Facebook and saw that my friend Alison’s son’s girlfriend posted something on Alison’s wall about the Iona Marble Quarry which got me thinking about my Iona marble ring that Jeremy’s parents gave me for my 21st birthday the year we stayed a week in a caravan park on the grounds of Castle Sween. I remembered wearing my Iona marble ring to the most recent Burns’ Night at the aforementioned Alison’s house, but had not seen it recently. I assumed it was in one of my jewelry boxes, but went downstairs to check. It was not in either of my jewelry boxes.
Not my ring, but similar
I told myself to not panic and figured I would look through drawers over the weekend. I thought that perhaps I gave it to my daughter — the ring is slightly too large for my ring fingers. I texted Clare to see if I gave it to her along with a similar ring I found on the Internet. She replied, “Whooooa no you never gave me that whaaaaat.”
I was sad (but glad I didn’t give it to Clare after all) so I did check one drawer, thinking perhaps I put it there after Burns’ Night and never put it away. I dumped out the contents of the drawer but could not find the ring. I did, however, find Rupert.
Rupert and the Sunrise
I’d been a little worried that I’d lost Rupert, you see. I was too worried to do a whole house search because if I didn’t find him, then he would be lost for ever and ever and that would be sad. Even sadder if I lost the ring. Rupert, if you don’t already know, was originally found by the aforementioned Jeremy in 2002 when we stopped by Todmorden to pay his family a visit.
I was so happy to have found Rupert that I stopped looking for the ring.
On Saturday morning I thought I would check my jewelry boxes one more time. This time I dumped out one of the jewelry boxes on my bed. It didn’t look promising, but I did find a pair of earrings I thought I’d given the aforementioned Clare when her earlobe piercings seemed to be closing up. The posts were a little smaller than most other posts and I thought it would help. You see, for the past several years I have been a little sad because my earlobe piercings seemed to be closed. I could not find a pair of earrings that would fit in the holes and was pretty sure I’d need to have them re-pierced, something I didn’t want to deal with. I tried one earring on — it went through the hole! I tried the other earring and it, too, went through the hole. While I was delighting in my earring success I glanced down at the bed and noticed my Iona marble ring.
All because Alison’s son’s girlfriend posted a link on Alison’s timeline.
I’ve just finished a deep clean of my office. I was getting a stuffy nose sitting at my desk so decided to take everything off the desk and wipe it down well, dust all monitors and other desk items and return them to the desk. Then I thought I should take everything out of my closet and vacuum the rug in there and sweep under all other furniture in the office. I vowed to not put anything back in my closet that I didn’t need. That was about 15 days ago and I just finished about an hour ago. I have two garbage bags full of trash, two bags of stuff that belongs in other parts of the house that found its way to my attic and an overflowing moving box of items to donate. One of the items in that box is a tiara.
You see, I don’t need a tiara. and I’ve been meaning to blog about this tiara so I could dispose of it because it is really hard to store a tiara and even harder to display a tiara.
Here’s the story of the tiara.
Twelve years ago around this time I was still trying to emotionally and intellectually process the attacks of September 11. Then the anthrax attacks started happening. We were told to be wary of our mail — not knowing who was going to be targeted next.
One day at work I was given a package. It was a small, light cube-shaped brown package and had been mailed through the US Postal system. It had no return address. I was afraid to open it. Normally I tear into packages, but not this one. I let it sit on my desk in my cubical. Finally our administrative assistant asked what was in the package and I told her I had not opened it yet. She said I should and that I had no reason to think it was anthrax or anything else dangerous. So I brought it to her desk and slowly opened it.
What I found inside was nothing I would ever have guessed — t was a silver and (fake) gemstone tiara on which the word DIVA was spelled out in metal and gems.
The note inside explained it all. Joanne, my one-time friend, and I had met for lunch one day in late summer. We discussed my work and she said I was a 508 Guru. I said, not a Guru, a Diva. So when she saw the Diva tiara at a store she wanted to buy it for me to wear when I did my Section 508 work. She also wanted me to know she was thinking of me, living close to some of the 9-11 attacks.
It was a thoughtful gift and it was a turning point in how I felt about the September 11 events. For some reason I felt that having such a sparkly tiara, I was somehow safe. Nothing bad would happen to me. I kept it at work and occasionally wore it when I did 508 work — mostly when someone else was looking.
Damn, now I want to take it out of the give-away box…
Clutch Cargo Lips 