Whatever It Takes

Tonight I'm wearing a ring that has a diamond in it that was my great aunt, Pelagia's. It was from her wedding ring when she married in 1928. She was called Pela by her family growing up, until she got her social security number in order to work, when they gave her a more "American" sounding name. I grew up knowing her by that other name, that was not her own. I only discovered it wasn't her real name some 30 years later.

I do genealogy, and I have pictures of Pela that I inherited after she passed on. In those pictures, she is holding babies, and the look on her face is one of pure expectation and joy. She loved babies and wanted many of her own. It never turned out that she could have any. As I wear this ring and look at the pictures of her youth, I'm struck by the unexpected turns in life and where it takes us.

The fact that I'm wearing this ring at all is the result of unexpected turns. Pela was my godmother, and my half-brother Renfisher was my godfather, back in 1966. She thought she was too old to be a godmother to anyone, and encouraged mother Main to find someone younger. My mother was adamant it should be her.

I grew up hearing my mother's take on family stories. There was a big rift between Pela and several other family members, where she, according to accounts, willfully cut off several of our family, never to speak to them again. This loomed large in my mother's narrative, possibly because it happened in her youth and she was closer to the family members it impacted. As it turned out, at her funeral, I was the only biological family member there.

She tried to cut me out of her life at one point, too. Not for an infraction or due to any animosity between us, but because she felt she was too old, and that I needed to get on with my life. I was more stubborn than she was, and simply told her no. She'd have to try harder if she was getting me out of her life, I told her, and she left it at that.

So I'm wearing this ring with the 82 year old diamond of hers, and thinking of what 82 years all means, and the unexpected turns we have in our lives all means. Pela didn't have the children she wanted, and cut off a great deal of her family, yet she was one of the most nurturing and loving of people I knew.

I certainly didn't expect to be wearing her diamond. What had happened was that after she passed, there was a bidding war for it. Someone outside the family who was a dear and wonderful friend to my aunt had wanted it, and my grandmother, Pela's sister in law, said no. She was absolutely adamant about it. It needed to stay in the family, she said:

"Bid on it," she said.

"How much?" I asked.

"Whatever it takes," she responded.

Now, as I am sitting here with it, years after the fact, I'm thinking that's what we do when we are faced with the unexpected turns of life. Life throws down the gauntlet and challenges us, and we in turn, need to do whatever it takes.

In Pela's case, while she couldn't have children of her own, she nurtured some things in me that allowed me to grow in the direction that I have. That in turn has helped me to give a good life to my son and I, despite the ever-shifting changes that life has to offer. In a way, the things she gave me, both tangible and intangible, have helped more people in this world than what she might have done parenting a half dozen children, if she'd been able to do so. By my account, her grace, wisdom, and freedom of thought have helped nigh on a thousand people, through my ability to "pay it forward."

I don't wear this ring often, and I have to ask myself why. I think I associated it with hopes and dreams she had on her wedding day that never came to pass. Or of dreams her friend had of having it for herself that also didn't come to pass. When things don't come about the way that we hope and envision them to be, is that a loss or a gift? I guess it all comes down to the perspective we take, and our ability to do whatever it takes in the end.