Earthly treasure
Jewellery is a strange topic for me to be writing about, since I have little to no interest in it. My mother, very wisely, has handed over her precious collection to my spouse and not to me, fearing - rightly - that I will get it mixed up with junk and be unable to tell the difference. Nevertheless...
Recently, having made the questionable decision to accept an invitation to a formal event, I was forced to look over my stash of nice clothes and jewellery that my family and friends have bestowed on me over the years. I picked my most expensive and beautiful sari and then had to decide what ornaments would go with it. The sari was a "peacock-throat" colour (ময়ূরকন্ঠী), an iridescent blue-green. So my easy, go-to, always-lying-about-on-the-dresser, red jewellery wasn't going to work. This meant digging into boxes, drawers, memories...
A lot of the necklaces, ear tops and bangles, stuffed into velvet cases of many sizes or tangled in larger ornate boxes, stared at me dumbly. There was no mutual recognition. But one set suddenly stood out in its familiarity and hit me with a sudden pang of sorrow. Each ear top was a cluster of tiny pearls tipped with gold, surrounded by a circle of little red stones. It looked like a white flower in full bloom, cradled in red leaves lined with gold. The pearl chain that went with it, supported a gold locket set with the same tiny pearls and red stones. My mother used to wear it quite often when going out to a party. I would be sitting by the window with a book, in my tattered nightie, and my mother would come by in a freshly ironed sari, fragrant, dabbing generous amounts of white powder on her face, asking "Do I look okay?" I thought she looked good, despite the hair sticking out from a mole on her chin and white patches left on her face by excessive powdering (her theory was that sweat would even out the patches by the time she got to the party). She carried herself well, straight-backed, her hair, lifted into two peaks on both sides of the middle parting in the style of her youth, looked becoming, and her lips were nicely shaped. But now, the pearl-flower tops and matching necklace were carelessly tossed into a dresser drawer in my house, and would never adorn my party-bound mother again.
Something totally white would be best I thought, since I didn't possess anything blue or green to match the sari. But what was this? One box opened to reveal a peacock motif necklace with green and white stones and large paisley shaped ear tops to match. Was this mine? It looked vaguely familiar. My in-laws must have given it to me to wear with the heavy green silk sari embellished with silver zari - the whole ensemble, except for the bottle green silk blouse, had only been worn by me that one day, my wedding reception at their house. My sister-in-law had enthusiastically done all the shopping. She had always loved dressing up and had enjoyed choosing the beautifully crafted pieces for me. She still dresses up, but more with grim determination than the joyous abandon of the past. She dresses up so tragedy will not define and defeat her, and someone, beloved and lost, will look at her and be proud.
The elaborate green-white-gold set went back into the drawer.The colors matched but the sari was too ornate, it needed something simpler to go with it. Maybe my everyday pearl ear tops, paired with a pearl necklace, would do? I lost one of those single round pearls in a gold setting once and was sad because I really like them. And not only because my five aunts (dad's sisters) gave it to me when I got my Ph.D. "You are the first woman Ph.D. from our family" they said. Everything about my Ph.D. was fake - the motivation, the experience, the quality - but my aunts' affection for me was not, so I treasured the gift, wore it everyday and was more bereft than I expected to be when one ear top vanished. Imagine how thrilled I was, when several months later, it miraculously reappeared, of all places, in the washer! It fell out as I was transferring a bunch of clothes to the laundry basket.
All the pearl chains, single or multiple stranded, straight or swirled, seemed to have mismatched lockets attached. I was sure there was at least one somewhere, locketless. I continued opening boxes. From a small, green plastic box emerged a pair of gold jhumkas. Almost seventy years ago, they had been gifted by a doting father to his precious eldest daughter when she left his home for another. I love hearing stories about my mother-in-law's father, he was such an atypical man for his times. He woke up early to make tea for his wife who liked to sleep in late. He would tell his daughters to leave their dirty clothes for him to wash. He was adept with a sewing machine and sewed clothes for his family. And yet, he was not a stay-at-home dad. He was a doctor who had worked for the British army during the second world war and had been missing in Burma for many months during which his family had no idea whether he was coming home. He used to say to his wife, "We must give extra affection to our daughters - who knows in what kind of home they will end up, what their lives will be like." Maybe some day the jhumkas will make their way to a jeweller who will weigh them and tap them and inspect them with critical eyes and put a price on them, never knowing that they are priceless.
Finally..here was a pearl necklace with unobtrusive green-maroon beads in between but no locket. And here another pearl ear top, a lot like the regular one but with a few white stones atop the pearl. These would do perfectly. Time to put everything back in the boxes, the boxes back in the drawers, firmly shut the drawers and move on with life.
Recently, having made the questionable decision to accept an invitation to a formal event, I was forced to look over my stash of nice clothes and jewellery that my family and friends have bestowed on me over the years. I picked my most expensive and beautiful sari and then had to decide what ornaments would go with it. The sari was a "peacock-throat" colour (ময়ূরকন্ঠী), an iridescent blue-green. So my easy, go-to, always-lying-about-on-the-dresser, red jewellery wasn't going to work. This meant digging into boxes, drawers, memories...
A lot of the necklaces, ear tops and bangles, stuffed into velvet cases of many sizes or tangled in larger ornate boxes, stared at me dumbly. There was no mutual recognition. But one set suddenly stood out in its familiarity and hit me with a sudden pang of sorrow. Each ear top was a cluster of tiny pearls tipped with gold, surrounded by a circle of little red stones. It looked like a white flower in full bloom, cradled in red leaves lined with gold. The pearl chain that went with it, supported a gold locket set with the same tiny pearls and red stones. My mother used to wear it quite often when going out to a party. I would be sitting by the window with a book, in my tattered nightie, and my mother would come by in a freshly ironed sari, fragrant, dabbing generous amounts of white powder on her face, asking "Do I look okay?" I thought she looked good, despite the hair sticking out from a mole on her chin and white patches left on her face by excessive powdering (her theory was that sweat would even out the patches by the time she got to the party). She carried herself well, straight-backed, her hair, lifted into two peaks on both sides of the middle parting in the style of her youth, looked becoming, and her lips were nicely shaped. But now, the pearl-flower tops and matching necklace were carelessly tossed into a dresser drawer in my house, and would never adorn my party-bound mother again.
Something totally white would be best I thought, since I didn't possess anything blue or green to match the sari. But what was this? One box opened to reveal a peacock motif necklace with green and white stones and large paisley shaped ear tops to match. Was this mine? It looked vaguely familiar. My in-laws must have given it to me to wear with the heavy green silk sari embellished with silver zari - the whole ensemble, except for the bottle green silk blouse, had only been worn by me that one day, my wedding reception at their house. My sister-in-law had enthusiastically done all the shopping. She had always loved dressing up and had enjoyed choosing the beautifully crafted pieces for me. She still dresses up, but more with grim determination than the joyous abandon of the past. She dresses up so tragedy will not define and defeat her, and someone, beloved and lost, will look at her and be proud.
The elaborate green-white-gold set went back into the drawer.The colors matched but the sari was too ornate, it needed something simpler to go with it. Maybe my everyday pearl ear tops, paired with a pearl necklace, would do? I lost one of those single round pearls in a gold setting once and was sad because I really like them. And not only because my five aunts (dad's sisters) gave it to me when I got my Ph.D. "You are the first woman Ph.D. from our family" they said. Everything about my Ph.D. was fake - the motivation, the experience, the quality - but my aunts' affection for me was not, so I treasured the gift, wore it everyday and was more bereft than I expected to be when one ear top vanished. Imagine how thrilled I was, when several months later, it miraculously reappeared, of all places, in the washer! It fell out as I was transferring a bunch of clothes to the laundry basket.
All the pearl chains, single or multiple stranded, straight or swirled, seemed to have mismatched lockets attached. I was sure there was at least one somewhere, locketless. I continued opening boxes. From a small, green plastic box emerged a pair of gold jhumkas. Almost seventy years ago, they had been gifted by a doting father to his precious eldest daughter when she left his home for another. I love hearing stories about my mother-in-law's father, he was such an atypical man for his times. He woke up early to make tea for his wife who liked to sleep in late. He would tell his daughters to leave their dirty clothes for him to wash. He was adept with a sewing machine and sewed clothes for his family. And yet, he was not a stay-at-home dad. He was a doctor who had worked for the British army during the second world war and had been missing in Burma for many months during which his family had no idea whether he was coming home. He used to say to his wife, "We must give extra affection to our daughters - who knows in what kind of home they will end up, what their lives will be like." Maybe some day the jhumkas will make their way to a jeweller who will weigh them and tap them and inspect them with critical eyes and put a price on them, never knowing that they are priceless.
Finally..here was a pearl necklace with unobtrusive green-maroon beads in between but no locket. And here another pearl ear top, a lot like the regular one but with a few white stones atop the pearl. These would do perfectly. Time to put everything back in the boxes, the boxes back in the drawers, firmly shut the drawers and move on with life.
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