One ring to rule them all

Started: 2010-12-29 10:21:09

Submitted: 2010-12-29 10:50:19

Visibility: World-readable

When Kiesa and I got married eight years ago, we bought wedding rings at Tiffany & Company in downtown Portland after an afternoon looking around at various stores in search of something that spoke to us. It was warm that day, and I had gained weight during college that I didn't manage to lose for another six years. My ring has been especially loose for the last two years, and I kept meaning to get it resized but hadn't quite gotten around to it yet.

(Before losing weight, I did lose my ring one day while snowshoeing at Brainard Lake several years ago: I was putting my snowshoes on with bare, ungloved hands when I shook my hand to get some snow off and my ring flew off my finger. I searched for the ring and couldn't find it in the snow and eventually gave up and went snowshoeing. When I got back to the trailhead I found a note posted on the trailhead sign that someone had found a ring. I was pretty sure it was mine, so I picked up the note and headed back to my car, intending to call when I was back in civilization. It turned out the occupants of the car parked immediately behind me had returned to their car just as I was returning, so I inquired if they were the ones who had found the ring and retrieved it from them on the spot.)

The second time I lost my ring was on a Saturday in late October when I was home sick. I knew I hadn't left the house all day but I couldn't figure out what had happened to my ring; I just happened to glance down in the afternoon and notice that my ring was no longer on my finger. I assumed it must have fallen off but it wasn't sitting around anywhere obvious and wasn't sitting in any obvious place in the heater vents or drains. I assumed it had fallen down a vent or drain and I was never going to get it back. Two weeks later, while packing for #humblikswedding, I found my ring in the front pocket of my camera bag. I couldn't think of any obvious way it could have gotten there; I don't recall doing anything with my camera that day, and I hadn't opened that pocket since then, so my best hypothesis was that Calvin found my ring on the floor (possibly next to the couch, where I had been resting while sick) and put it in my camera bag, which makes some sense since he recently discovered zippers, and he's always been enthralled by putting smaller objects inside larger containers.

After two weeks without my ring, my hand suddenly felt imbalanced; I could feel the seven grams on my ring finger as I typed. I knew I needed to resize my ring to fit my smaller finger but I didn't want to make the trip to the nearest Tiffany & Company in Denver.

The opportunity to visit Tiffany finally came this Monday, when Kiesa and I took Calvin to Portland to go to the zoo with Aunt Bethany. After the zoo, we ate lunch at an Indian restaurant north-west of downtown Portland. As we exited the restaurant, I was carrying Calvin across the parking lot when I felt my ring fall off my finger. I didn't hear it hit the ground, so I thought it had gotten caught in a fold of clothing, but I couldn't find it in either mine or Calvin's clothing, or on the ground. After a few minutes we gave up and continued to our car, which we'd parked two blocks away. A block later, crossing the street, I heard the sharp metallic ting of the ring hitting the ground and Kiesa found it rolling toward the gutter. She picked it up and held it until I could put it into my coat's inner zipper pocket to avoid loosing it again.

Since we were in downtown Portland, we drove to a more-convenient parking lot across the street from Powells and I headed to Tiffany & Company while Kiesa sat in the car with Calvin, who had fallen asleep on his afternoon nap before we'd driven two blocks. I took Max to Tiffany, talked to the customer service window, tried on a variety of ring sizes, settled on 8.5 (down from 10), and handed over my ring. They'll ship it to New York to get resized (if they can in fact resize it; the pattern around the edges may preclude that) and then ship it back to me at home in about two weeks.

I am pleased that I not only managed to avoid loosing my ring permanently but that I was in Portland in the right place to get my ring resized without too much hassle.