Day 15—Hospital Earrings, Duluth, Minnesota

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My triplets, circa summer 2017

The hospital visits began with an afternoon phone call from Sandi’s son, who lives on the West Coast. Sandi had gone to the hospital in the morning. Tests run by the emergency room doctor revealed kidney stones and she was having a rough time. He couldn’t reach his sister who was out in the countryside where cell reception was spotty. Could I go to the hospital?

Sure.

Sandi had kidney stones, but the ER doctor also found a mass on her kidney. A kidney doctor said he needed to take care of the kidney stones in her good kidney before he could remove her cancerous kidney.

After her kidney stone problem was eradicated, her cancerous kidney was removed.

Not long after, a routine colonoscopy revealed a large tumor in her colon. A doctor removed the tumor, which she said looked benign, and sent it for testing. Cancer.

We hoped the cancer hadn’t spread, but a body scan revealed cancer in Sandi’s liver.

Over the next couple of years, I lost track of my visits to see Sandi when she would be in the hospital.

On one visit, I stopped by the hospital’s gift shop before I left. Hospitals have the best gift shops. I walked through the shop, letting time stand still. I looked at the beautiful gifts for sale, gifts for women and men and children and newborns. Scarves, purses, jewelry, crystal figurines, frames, vases, toys, books, stationery, slippers, clothing—a smattering of everything.

Before leaving the shop, I bought a cup of coffee and a cookie. I scrutinized a circular rack of earrings on the countertop. A pair of earrings caught my eye. I bought them, knowing they would remind me of Sandi and my trips to the hospital to see her.

By the time I bought these earrings, the cancer had already shown up in Sandi’s colon and liver. Her family and friends all hoped for a cure, but I wondered if each new procedure or treatment designed to beat back the spreading and recurring cancer had scraped away their hope like it did mine.

I wore these earrings while Sandi was still alive. She liked them. Although, they were a bit subdued for her taste.

Sandi rarely wore earrings, except when she went on a cruise. Then she wore long dangling earrings with lots of glittering crystals and colorful beads. She called them her “slutties,” and she wore them with formal evening attire to dinners on cruises. She bought a new pair for every cruise. “Look at the new slutties I bought for my cruise,” she’d beam. “It’s not easy being eye candy, you know.”

I wore these earrings after Sandi died. I wondered if she’d chosen a pair of her slutties to be buried in. I don’t remember which earrings I wore to her funeral in September 2018.

One morning in November 2018, almost three months after Sandi died, I wore these earrings to work. After I returned home, I discovered I had one naked ear. I hadn’t worn the rubber backs. The wire hooks were so long, I thought they couldn’t fall out.

You’d think I’d learn. [Read: Thirty Days of Earrings.] I was devastated. I tried to find the earring when I went back to work. I asked coworkers. I checked the lost and found. It was gone. My earring was single.

I began a quest to find another pair. I bought these earrings in 2017, so in 2018, they were last year’s design made by the company Silver Forest. For years I’d seen their earrings displayed in many gift shops. So, whenever I entered a gift shop in Minnesota, Wisconsin, or Michigan, I checked to see if they carried Silver Forest earrings. I often found their displays, but I never found the same pair of earrings.

Then it occurred to me to look up the company on the internet. Turns out they will repair a broken earring or replace a lost earring if they still have the design elements. But I had to send the remaining earring back to them so they could match the new one to it. For sentimental reasons I was afraid of losing the remaining earring.

Already in the spirit of internet searching, I turned to Amazon. I searched through almost one hundred pairs of Silver Forest earrings, but I found them. Now I have three identical earrings. I don’t know which one is the original mate of the lost earring.

When I told this story to someone, they asked me if I still had the original earring. “Of course,” I said. “What if I’d thrown it out then found the other one?” I know a woman who lost an earring but refused to throw the other one away. Months later, in the spring after the snow and ice melted in her driveway, she found her lost earring. And it was unscathed.

I like to think Sandi has my lost earring in heaven with her, and when I see her someday, she will hold out her palm with my earring and say, “Did you lose something?” before she even says hello.

And I will respond, “How the heck did you get that?”

She will answer with one of her favorite retorts, “Let me splain it to you, Lucy. It doesn’t matter how long the hooks are on a pair of earrings—always wear the rubber backings.”

Day 14—Icy, Pale Blue Earrings

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Purchased summer 2019 from Waters of Superior, Duluth, Minnesota. Closed permanently in September 2020, because of the pandemic.

The icy, pale blue crystals of these earrings remind me of NASA’s eyes. She was a Siberian Huskey and a loyal companion to a man named Tom. He named her after the National Aeronautics Space Administration because space exploration thrilled him.

Tom was a steelworker, who helped build the Sears Tower in Chicago, among other structures. He was also a private pilot and a skydiver. That’s how my father met him. My father was a private pilot who had a business hauling skydivers. Tom made lots of jumps out of my father’s plane.

Tom and NASA seemed made for each other. They were both strong, muscular, and compact, with piercing blue eyes, Tom’s being a couple of shades darker than NASA’s. They were both independent. NASA was protective of Tom and didn’t welcome other people or dogs into their circle. And that was fine with Tom.

NASA had an interesting life. She went almost everywhere with Tom, and when she couldn’t, she stayed with his mother.

In the early 1970s, when Tom spent a year in Hawaii working on a construction project, NASA went with him. She had to spend time in quarantine after arriving in Hawaii, but Tom wasn’t going to be without her for a year.

Tom had an apartment in Chicago, but sometimes slept in the back of his pickup truck with NASA when he came to Franklin, Wisconsin, to skydive. His truck had a topper and under the topper, he always had sleeping gear. They sometimes slept in the truck in our driveway or at the drop zone. Once when my parents offered Tom a bed or couch in our home, he chose to sleep with his dog in the back of his pickup truck.

When Tom moved to San Francisco in 1977, NASA went too. When she passed away after a long happy life, he buried her on a hill with a beautiful view.

Funny thing, I remember more about Tom than other skydivers who came to our house for meals or to have my father fix their vehicles. This is because of NASA. She intrigued me because she had a lifestyle that no other dog I’d ever known had. She was the only dog I knew of that slept on the packing table in a skydiving shack while her master went up in a plane, jumped out, and floated back to earth. She’d wait without moving, until Tom came back to repack his parachute.

And anyone who remained in the shack gave her space.

Day 13—My Diamond Studs Get Jackets

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Earring jackets. The posts go through the small holes at the top.

Yesterday I wrote about my husband surprising me with diamond earrings for Christmas.

He had one more bit of jewelry magic up his sleeve. When he bought my earrings at Christmas, the salesperson told him about jackets for stud earrings. Yes, it’s the Northland. Winters are cold around here. Diamond earrings need jackets, don’t ya know.

My earrings got their jackets in March, when I had my birthday. March is plenty cold, so jackets were appropriate. When I opened them, he called them something so cute that I wish I could remember what it was, but it wasn’t jackets. He had substituted some other word.

I remember my oldest son called the grill a congrilla. And on warm summer days, he’d ask me, “Can we get Grandpa George and cook something on the congrilla?” If I had time, we’d get something from the store to grill then pick up his great-grandpa George. My son still loves to grill. Sometimes I still use the word congrilla for grill.

I remember my youngest son, when he was about five, would announce, “I’m thirty.”

“You’re thirty?” I’d ask.

“No, I’m thirty,” he’d say.

“Oh, you’re thirty,” I’d say.

“No, I’m thirty,” he’d say, getting frustrated and near tears.

“Oh, you’re thirsty,” I’d say.

“Yes!” he’d say, relieved his mother finally understood.

I know. I was bad. But he still talks to me.

When my grandkids ask me for a drink of water, I ask them if they’re thirty. “No,” they’ll say, “we’re not that old.” I laugh and give them water. They look at me like I’m the Madwoman of Chaillot.

I wish I could remember what my husband called the earring jackets because his word was better. But he only said it once. It didn’t become part of an Abbot and Costello routine between us. So, the word is in my brain, but the pathway to retrieve it is permanently corrupted. But the imagine of him presenting me with the elegant jackets for my Christmas earrings remains. And so does the moment of humor, even without remembering the funny word.

Day 12—Christmas Surprise Earrings, Circa 1999.

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Diamonds are difficult to photograph.

I opened my last gift, a small box that had been tucked under the tree in the back. Inside a pair of “mama-bear” diamond stud earrings winked at me.

I had long wanted a pair of diamond earrings, but the reality is two diamonds cost more than one, like double the price. I didn’t want to settle for tiny diamonds because I wanted them to catch and throw light. But I didn’t want diamonds so big they looked fake. I had wanted mama-bear-sized diamonds, which were still in a fairy tale beyond my budget.

I gushed, and told my husband they were perfect. But I worried they cost more than our Christmas budget allowed. He’d won the money on a football pool. He’d guessed, correctly, the outcomes of more football matchups during the season than anyone else. And he used the money he won to buy me diamond earrings.

“I’m sorry they’re kind of small,” he said.

“Are you kidding?” I laughed. “I was just thinking they’re so big.”

I put on my new earrings. My husband gave up his winnings to buy me a special gift. I think of my diamond studs as my O. Henry earrings.

Day 11—Winter Earrings

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I wasn’t looking to buy earrings. (Ho, ho, ho.) I was just looking at the rack, passing time while my mother shopped for clothes in a boutique in Harbor Springs, Michigan.

But when I saw these silver-colored drop earrings with hints of black peeking through the cutwork, and set with white crystals, I changed my mind. At just under $30, my wallet agreed.

But my mother and I arrived at the checkout counter at the same time, and she bought them for me.

I call these my winter earrings because they make me think of snowflakes, silver bells, and icicles.

They pair nicely with a black-and-white winter sweater my mother bought me for Christmas in 2018, three months after she bought me the earrings.

This year I hope to wear the earrings and the winter sweater while sharing Christmas dinner with my mother.

Overlooking Lake Michigan, Christmas Eve morning, 2018

Day 10—Butterfly Earrings

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Circa, 2017

Today’s earrings don’t have a special story.

I don’t remember exactly where I bought them. But I know it was a quiet gift shop in a sleepy town somewhere.

The kind of shop I would enter to find one clerk and no one buying anything. I would get the feeling that I was the first person (and would be the last) to have entered the shop all day.

When I enter a shop with this vibe, I begin to look for something to buy. A sympathy purchase. I have several pairs of earrings that have been sympathy purchases.

These earrings could also be called a guilt purchase. I knew I’d feel guilty wandering around a shop for fifteen minutes as the only customer and not buying something. (Thinking akin to my stopping at a gas station just to use the bathroom because I always buy something: gum, candy, water.)

These earrings are fine, but I wouldn’t own them if there had been other customers in the shop.

Day 9—My Earring Gets a Bruise.

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Today’s earrings were a gift from my son, circa 1991. He doesn’t remember selecting them for me because he was about five and a half, but he did go to the jewelry store with me.

I’d gone to the store to have a watch battery replaced. While I talked to the jeweler, my son stood by a stand of earrings and slowly turned the display.

“Mom,” he said, “you should buy these. They’re pretty.”

I turned to look and started to tell him I wasn’t buying earrings. But he was right, they were pretty.

Very pretty. Fourteen-karat gold. Inexpensive, considering.

“They’d look pretty on you,” he said. He wanted me to have them.

I bought them.

A couple of months later, I bruised one of the earrings.

I’d cradled the handset of a rotary phone between my shoulder and my ear, never thinking I could damage the earring because it was small.

When anyone had complimented me on these earrings, I’d smile and tell them my son bought them for me.

The bruised side of my earring

Now, I’d been careless with his gift.

I tried to buy another pair, but the jeweler couldn’t get another pair.

I asked if it could be repaired, but the jeweler said trying to fix it would make it worse.

I looked at the tiny dents located on one side of the earring.

Facing a mirror, I put on the earring and twisted it until the indentations were facing the floor. I looked into the mirror—I couldn’t see the damage, so no one else would.

I still wear them. They’re still pretty.

My small son wanted me to have them, so abandoning them was never an option.

Day 8—Beach Glass Earrings

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Today’s earrings are made from green beach glass and surrounded by silver. The earrings are fraternal rather than identical twins. You take beach glass as you find it—the surf will never spit up a pair of matching smooth frosted pieces of glass.

Beach glass fascinated me when I was a child. I had a stash of several green, white, and brown pieces in an old cardboard cigar box that held other small treasures. I liked tiny treasures—the kind of stuff my mother didn’t like cleaning out of my pockets or the washing machine.

I sometimes wonder where all the tiny treasures from my youth went.

I bought these earrings in early 2020 at the Dovetail Café & Marketplace in Duluth, a couple of months before the COVID-19 lockdown. I had recently discovered the Dovetail and enjoyed meeting friends there for coffee or lunch. I even read a story at one of their open mics then enjoyed a wonderful evening listening to other storytellers and poets.

These days I mark a lot of events as either before or during COVID.

I’m looking forward to adding after COVID.

Day 7—Earrings and Associations

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Today’s earrings came from my mother. She received them as a gift from a friend who’d taken a trip to Fiji. My mother wore them a few times, but they’re not her style.

My mother, her friend, and I have spent time together, going to Mackinac Island, eating meals together, watching fireworks from a deck on Lake Michigan. So, a few years after my mother received these earrings, she gave them to me.

I haven’t worn them since the pandemic started in 2020. They aren’t wear-with-a-pair-of-blue-jeans-and-a-T-shirt earrings. But today I think I pulled it off. I wore a navy-blue turtleneck, a pale blue sweater and blue jeans. And when I left the house in the afternoon rain, I wore a dark-blue rain jacket with a sophisticated yet subtle tone-on-tone print. The earrings and rain jacket could be soulmates. (If you’re wondering, Anna Wintour never worries when I talk fashion.)

These earrings remind me of a ride in the backseat of a rented midsized sedan from Kohler, Wisconsin, to Milwaukee in July 2010.

I sat in the middle of the backseat because it was my turn to sit in the middle. And because no one cared about my moderate claustrophobia.

As I slid into the center of the seat, I remembered a surgeon’s advice before I had an MRI: “Close your eyes before you enter the tube and don’t open them.”

My mother drove out of the parking lot. I tilted my head back and closed my eyes. I asked my sister-in-law, who sat to my right, to tell me about her scuba diving trip to Bali.

I asked why she wanted to learn to scuba dive. She has lived in Arizona all her life.

I asked her how she learned. Pools were involved.

I asked her about the dangers. There’s a lot that can go wrong on a dive.

I asked her about the world under the waves.

For fifty miles, a blue-green ocean teaming with exotic fish, coral reefs, and scuba divers screened on my eyelids. For every question I asked, she wove a narrative taking me out of the middle of that backseat. I kept my eyes closed.

These earrings remind me of Fiji, my mother, and her friend.

These earrings remind me of Bali, my sister-in-law, and fifty miles of scuba diving adventures.

I know Fiji is not Bali. My sister-in-law hasn’t met my mother’s friend. These earrings didn’t exist in July 2010.

Doesn’t matter. Neurons forge our networks of memories.

Every time I wear these earrings, I return to my happy place in the waters of Bali among fish and reefs and divers—a place I’ve never been.

Day 6—Traveling Teardrop Earrings

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I bought these earrings in Tucson, Arizona, in 2003. I went with my husband and sons to visit my mother and stepdad in Phoenix and my father and siblings in Tucson.

These earrings have traveled to Rhode Island, Iowa, Illinois, North Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Indiana, Hawaii, and Canada. These are hockey earrings. They’ve seen my youngest son play lots of hockey games in many cities. I have a rule about jewelry when I travel—only one pair of earrings and one necklace. These are the earrings that almost always made the cut.

I’ve worn these earrings more than any other pair of earrings I own, so maybe that makes them my favorite pair. As my mother would say, “You can wear them with blue jeans or an evening dress.”

I wore this pair to Winnipeg, Canada, to a hockey tournament. On Saturday morning, I was waiting in the car for my husband to come out of the hotel, so we could head to the rink.

After he got in the car, he said, “Do you feel naked?”

“What?” I hadn’t forgot to put on my pants. (This was long before COVID-19 and pants-less Zoom meetings and endless jokes about people forgetting to wear pants.)

He laughed and asked again, “Do you feel naked?”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

He extended a closed fist toward me then opened his fingers. Nestled on his palm were my teardrop earrings.

“I thought you might want these, so you didn’t feel naked,” he said.

“Yes, thanks.” I lifted my earrings off his palm and leaned over to kiss him before dressing my bare earlobes.

He had remembered that I had once said I felt naked if I forgot to wear earrings when I left the house.

I’ve never forgotten that he remembered.