The Half Pair

It's a story by Robert A. Heinlein, in which a young couple who live in a 2-person spaceship discover one of the man's cufflinks has gone missing out the airlock, and they go back and retrieve it, because having one-half of a pair of anything means you're letting things go. Losing your slim hold on the veneer of civilization. Losing your grip, period.

Well, I now am the sad owner of a half-pair of diamond earrings.

The earrings were a gift from Hubby about eight years ago. We were dirt poor, perpetually broke, and that particular gift from him represented a month's food money at the time.

They symbolized his love for me, his utter devotion and foolishment where I was concerned, that he'd go yet further into debt to buy me a "trinket" that I didn't need and we couldn't afford.

And about six months ago I suspected I'd lost one of them.

I'd been going out, and putting them in, and got distracted and left the house after only inserting one of them. The other was still in the drawer.

I discovered my error halfway through the evening and was horrified to think I'd lost it. Upon coming home I found it sitting in the drawer right where I'd left it, and I made the fatal mistake.

I put it's partner in the drawer with it.

Now, when I say "drawer", it's not an exact description. I have this Ikea headboard which has two sets of "drawers" that slide into the headboard - so everything looks neat and tidy. The idea is, you can hide the mess that usually sits on your night table by tucking the night table/drawer back into the headboard.

But there is no back to the drawer. It is a flat piece of wood. You can pull it forward to put things on it, and tuck it back, but things can fall off the edge at the back.

And at some point in the past six months, that's what happened to one of my diamond earrings. I didn't realize it, because I had so much junk on the drawer. I kept pawing around in the junk, looking for stuff, every day when I got dressed.

And in between then and now, I vaccumed, and now I have one diamond earring.

This morning I went through the vaccum bag, in one last desperate attempt to find the missing earring, but sadly, it must have been in the previous vaccum bag, before I had noticed it was missing.

And yes, I finally let go and cried. Hubby had been almost sheepish at how small they were, he had called them "specks:" but considering the portion of our income they represented, they felt to me like 2-karat diamonds. They felt like love, they shone with the madness of lovers, of two people hopelessly in love with each other and reckless of the consequences of their insanity. When I wore them, I was a queen.

And the loss of one of them brought back to mind everything I've disliked about myself since I was five years old with a snot-filled nose and dirt-choked fingernails, chewing gum I'd pried off sidewalks.

That I'm careless. I'm irresponsible. I'm lazy and selfish. I didn't deserve those earrings, as I don't deserve any jewellery. I'm a dirty little kid with pretentions of grandeur. I think I'm so smart, but I'm a dolt, an idiot, a grease-spot on the fabric of life. I didn't deserve my husband, I don't deserve to have any husband, or any friends either. A messy, useless, whiny lump. Why, those earrings would have looked better on a pig than on me. It serves me right to lose one of them, I'm surprised it didn't happen years ago, I take such lousy care of my possessions.

And so on. If anyone out there has ever found me a bit sharp-tongued at times, take comfort - I save the most potent venom for myself.