When i was young, my dad had a gold ring. one with his initials on it. I thought it was beautiful. Strong, understated, elegance. His initials, TBW, graced the head.
Its beauty appealed to me, as did the design. As his namesake my initials were the same.
When I was about 14, I asked if I could have it. "No, not yet, but you can wear it for a few days." But it was a man's ring, for a man's hand, something I did not yet have. I wrapped scotch tape around the shank to make it a little tighter and proudly showed it off to friends.
The first day I wore it to school, I lost it. Playing football during PE. Walking toward the locker room I realized it had come off my hand. There was that pass, when I reached high for the spiral, was that when? Or was it when Randy knocked me on my butt.
I went back to the field but knew it was a lost cause. Where we played was a mosaic of sod and clods and mounds and divots, clete prints and shoelaces, mouthguards and soda straws. Nothing orderly about it.
I think I waited a day or two before telling dad. Maybe a year. It was so long ago. But what I remember is that he did not get angry. Just a look of sadness and disappointment, the details of which he kept to himself. He was hoping, really hoping, that his teenage son would start to show signs of responsibility. That I would sense importance without having to be told, or lectured, as a child. Nope. Not yet. Not this year. Not this guy.
I don't even remember what he said. I'm sure there was a story about the ring that he had waited to tell me. How he got it. Gift? Purchase? Was it his Dad's? (we all had the same initials). That story is lost to time. All I know is that the ring was very very important to him and the moment I was entrusted with it, I let him down.
I learned a lesson about Dads and sons and the highs and lows of parenting. I thought about this ring often during my parenting years. There are times to let emotions show and times to keep them buried. Times when they do good and times when they don't. Some times you just keep the hurt or the joy inside, locked up, to be released in another time.
Later, somebody found a gold ring in a field at Everitt Junior High in Panama City, Florida.