There are a lot of rings in rivers. There, under a layer of silt and mud, a multitude of diamond rings gradually becoming covered with sludge and moss, growing dingier and more tarnished by the day. These rings were once worn and cherished by a host of good women. Or maybe they belonged to cruel women. Women with pure hearts and vicious tempers. Women with big smiles and twisted souls. Women who put supper on the table every night and mopped the floor every Saturday morning. Or perhaps she just sat on the couch, talking on the phone and eating bonbons. Maybe she had an agenda the whole time. But I would guarantee you, the rings in the water were loved. As were the men that gave them to the women who slung them. Their rings were never taken off till the day they were. But it’s not the diamond’s fault. The diamond had one job: to sparkle.

At first I didn’t write about it because it was all I could do to get dressed and drag myself to work, forget about extracting words from the shredded pieces of my heart and telling the world my woes.

Then I didn’t write because to write it made it real, and I didn’t want to see it in black and white. I didn’t want to see it at all. I wallowed in the land of delusion, where I didn’t think about it, talk about it, or write about it. I didn’t need therapy. I needed everyone to participate in the “everything is going to be fine” illusion with me. Of course, everyone knew better, including myself. But when people love you they see that sometimes the most helpful thing to do is not talk about it and drift along in your sinking canoe and bail water when the captain ain’t lookin’. Everything’s fine.

Then I didn’t write because I was healing, growing, trying to actually stitch my torn remnants of a life back together and to write was to remember what I once had. And that hurts as bad as any of the rest of it. What makes us sad is comparing what we thought our life was supposed to look like to what it is. Or the idea of something we do not have will make us happy. And we just don’t know that. We never know what may have happened. The world is a tricky place. And things can always be worse. So, it’s best to just roll with it. The more you fight, the more exhausted you become. There’s something to be said about the path of least resistance. And, speaking for myself, I found that when I prayed about it and just continued with my life, the answers presented themselves.

Who wants to read about heartache anyway? We all want a happy ending.

I ripped my diamonds off twice. That hot night in June, when I just knew I would die right there. And I didn’t care. I couldn’t stand to look at them. They were worthless. They meant nothing. I left them gleaming in the angel wing jewelry dish, where they always spent their nights, but now could spend their days. But he didn’t take them when he took everything else.

I slipped them back on a week later, cautiously. They glimmered as always. I guess I expected they would have dulled with my despair. But I wanted to be married, I wanted everyone to know I was married, and safe, and loved. The rings supposedly symbolized that. I saw relief in his eyes when he saw it back on my finger. I wore my set on vacation to St. George, a symbol that I was spoken for, even if I was traveling alone. I wore them to fend off unwanted attention. I wore them as part of a mask. I wore them until New Years Eve. And then I took them off and put them in the wallet I was carrying that day, for lack of knowing what else to do with them. And the next day I changed wallets.

It’s New Years Eve again. There was a heavy frost this morning and it glistened and twinkled like a present I once opened. And I knew today was the day. I’m an island, there is water all around. The trick would be to decide which one could have this precious stone. And I still gritted my teeth, remembering the hours I put in searching for it on my hands and knees at the Co-op, only to find it in the corner of my bathroom at home a week later. It looked like a scrapbook gem. But it was my diamond. I’d already had it replaced, the setting gaping empty like a mouth with a missing molar. And so back to the jeweler’s I went to have the replacement removed and the original put back in its rightful spot. Because to me, it was more than a rock. And now I was throwing it away, like rotting lettuce.

I wanted a bridge high above a clean river. I needed it to flow quickly, a Hellbender’s habitat. No lazy, sluggish, murky river for me and my jewels. Diamonds are formed from coal under pressure. A good woman can be likened to the same. We are made strong from performing efficiently and seamlessly when the clock is ticking. Never let them see you sweat. Be flawless, be one in a million. Be a diamond in the rough.

I parked and walked rapidly, the wind cutting through my clothes. I never have cared for suspension bridges, and every time I’m caught in traffic on any kind of bridge I try to calculate my chances of survival if it were to collapse. Perhaps I shouldn’t have watched The Mothman Prophesies that time. I breathed through my scarf, knowing I would be able to see my breath crystallize if I were to remove it. The sky was clear and blue, the only fog lay in spots along the bank, a patch here and there caught under a tree bent towards the river. Stopping halfway across at the highest point, I reflected on the last ten years. Oh, the absolute heartbreak. And people question me. If I had come here before, I might just go with them. But there’s no chance of that now. I looked at the rings in my palm. I could keep them. No one would ever have to know. I smiled at the fifty-seven tiny perfect stones one last time. They were mine no more. From the earth the came, and to the earth they return. I threw them as hard as I could, and the sun caught their many facets until the river swallowed them. And I walked away lighter.

All these diamonds in the waters aren’t tainted. They were treasured. But they were abandoned, maybe some in a reckless fashion, but most after careful consideration. Maybe someday mine will be found, washing up on a beach or a riverbank. And maybe it can be revived, and slipped onto another hopeful woman’s hand.

Smart women pawn them. Passionate women fling them.