Making the Best of It

He had heard a lot about me, from his wife and her sister, who is a close friend of mine. He and his wife were in town for a visit, and we got to meet for the first time. "I've heard so much about you," I said as I hugged him. Do you know how that is? How you hear this and that and the other thing about someone, and you form notions about the person, and then you meet, and it all comes together? Who you imagined this person to be and who he is when you finally meet all converge.

He and his wife treated us to lunch at a very posh restaurant right on the beach. (That's where the picture of me dressed in red in front of the red Ferrari was taken. It's that kind of place, where the valet puts all the really amazing cars up front.) We chatted casually, and then he began to ask me about my marriage and my divorce and my ex-husband, and it was almost like he was baiting me to say bad things about my husband. Now I have shared some things on this blog that are not flattering about my ex-husband, but I hope I have not done it in a mean spirited way. And I don't trash him in real life. I relaxed and didn't become defensive, and I had no problem answering this man's questions. I told him that my ex-husband is a good man, that we are friendly but not really friends, that he is a great father and grandfather, and a huge influence in who I am today.

He smiled and pushed back a little from the table, leaned back, and it was like I had passed some sort of test. He said how refreshing it was to hear me say that, and then went on to tell me about the many bitter divorced women he had known, women who hated their ex-husbands forever and such.

I told him it takes two to make a marriage, and it takes two people to get divorced, and that I hope I had learned from my mistakes. No one gets married intending to get divorced, but I think I have made the best of a less than ideal outcome. I am not bitter about the past, I am happy with my present, and I think I have an even better future to look forward to.

In my divorce settlement, I was awarded my diamond wedding ring. It was beautiful, and full of meaning. I wanted to make the best of it, not have it sit in a drawer somewhere, or be sold in some mercenary way. I had always loved mother's jewelry, with the children's birthstones, so I decided to turn my wedding ring into a mother's ring. I sold the wedding ring to a jeweler who doesn't melt it down for gold, but either reworks the diamonds or sells it intact. He told me he knew he could sell my ring as it was, and I liked knowing that it might become something wonderful for someone else. He wrote me a check, and I put it in my bank account, and another jeweler sold me my mother's ring. It's actually two stackable rings, three gems each, so that I can add to it if the family increases in the future. Six birthstones for my two sons, daughter-in-law and three grandchildren. An emerald, amethyst, alexandrite, garnet and two blue topazes.

My mother's ring makes me happy, and I feel that I honored my wedding ring and all it symbolized, by turning it into a mother's ring. Our family is the best part of who we were. Maybe a way to not be bitter about the past, is to move on but take all the best parts with you. Perhaps that's how we can make the best of it.

Susan