Rings on My Fingers

I remember seeing people with rings on many fingers, and wondered why they wore so many. Was it a display of wealth, of poor taste, of glamour? I now wear rings on every finger, and an older lady was amazed by the many rings. I told her I had to wear them all at once because I did not have enough years left to wear them all one at a time!

This morning I had a harbinger of fading things. At 5:45 it was still dark out, a dusky dark but I knew it meant the days were becoming shorter. While heat scorches me and wilts my drive, still I find it hard to yearn for autumn yet. But while watering flowers, I saw that a season change was whispering in my ear. Several spider webs, shiny with a dab of dew, are a sure sign that things are beginning to turn that direction. The geranium leaves were no longer a solid a green the shade of an avocado; the tips of some were sun-bleached to a lime hue.

Saturday was my high school class reunion, another sign of days and years passing. We have lost a couple of classmates and know that now the years will begin snatching a toll on our numbers with the passing time. Next reunion in five years will be the 50^th, a half a century for Pete’s Sakes! How did that happen? Only yesterday we were wearing Poor Boy shirts, listening to the Stones, and moving with nimble and limber bodies. Now we bend slower, sit longer, are thicker in the middle, and wear hair either in shades of gray or sliding to the back of our heads. One thing had not changed…the laughter and, of course, the memories. Cars rust, bodies change, money vanishes, and job titles change, but nothing can take away the memories of being sixteen once and laughing riotously with life.

Slender threads of spider lace…memories…hum, maybe I better go buy a new ring for my fingers!