My Engagement Ring was in a Crown Royal Bag, Buried in Pecans

5/12/2002

My job helping the Library of International Studies move is almost over. I’ve finished my preservation work with the Russian newspapers, and now I’m boxing, bar coding, and cataloging modern Japanese periodicals. It’s wonderful work, but last week I had the privilege of doing something that made me feel like a complete vandal. I destroyed a card catalog.

It was thirty drawers full of meticulous cataloging work done by women over three or four decades. Each card had the most precise typewritten punctuation and annotation you’ve ever seen; these librarians were masters of their art working in the largest academic library system in the country. Everything had been cross-referenced, double checked, and was a thoroughly accurate research tool.

It took me about 25 minutes to demolish the whole thing.

Ying-Ming, the librarian who gave me the order, couldn’t watch. She told me what to do: “Elizabeth, please empty out this catalog. Take all these cards to the recycling bin. Everything’s been on computer since 1985, and we just don’t need to take this with us when we move.”

“Are you sure?”

She covered her eyes with her hands. “Yes.” She took a breath. “I’ll be at my desk. I can’t watch.”

Even though I’m an atheist, I felt the need to do some penance after that day.

Last week wasn’t my favorite week in all the year. This is my first mid-May without exams, but the stress of change still managed to find me anyway. I realized that with just two paychecks left from this project position, I’ve managed not to accomplish much. All three months of full time employment did for me was to catch me up on my bills, provide me with some dental work, and afford me that frugal trip to DC. I’m very grateful to have had this job, but at the end of May I’ll be right back exactly where I was five months ago: overeducated, unemployed, and dead broke.

And in those three months, I didn’t buy any new clothes, or books, or go to any shows. The last movie I saw was about a village of Norwegian fishermen who sing. This job has allowed me to financially tread water, but my arms are getting tired. And as I sit around my house on the weekend drinking a beer and eating okra I fried myself, I have to consider, one more time, the inevitability of my move to Atlanta.

Because pauper that I may be in New England, if I were in the South I’d be doing pretty damn well. The differences in class and economic structure are simply that great. I went out last week to drink with Maria once more before she leaves for her Minnesota home next week. The girls from Countway were there, and we all had a good time (a great time), but I found myself looking at shocked faces when I told them that none of my family would be at the graduation ceremony next weekend.

“Why?”

“Well, because no one in my family can afford a trip to Boston right now.”

Yet most of my family is considered to be solid middle class in the South. Even my cousins just my age (and some younger) own their homes, and most of them have children. Funny, only my cousin Joe and I were the ones who went to college and graduated, and we’re the only ones over 23 without a house and children. Stay in school, kids.

In fact, last week brought news of my cousin Audrey’s move into her new house with her husband and beautiful young son, as well as my cousin Chris’ expectations of soon being a father (he all ready has his house). As I racked my brain for ideas of proper gifts, I received a package from my grandfather in the mail, my graduation gift some months late but still very appreciated. Grandpa gave me a wonderful letter of encouragement, a two pound coffee can full of shelled pecans from my uncle’s farm outside of Augusta, and a diamond engagement ring.

Yup, that’s right, I’m struggling to pay my bills, but I’ve got a ring full of shiny rocks that would make any debutante blush with envy. When I called my grandfather to thank him profusely, I inquired about the origin of the ring, and he dodged me on it, saying only that he had it made from “a few old family pieces”. I can make educated guesses about where the stones came from: any of my late Great-Aunt Viola’s rings (she was married so many times in the state of Louisiana that she couldn’t get married there any more), and some of my grandfather’s own failed romantic attempts may have left him with a surplus of diamonds (he’s on impending marriage to wife 4 from engagement 6- although Alberta, the current, is certainly one of my favorite people in all the world).

So my Grandfather has seen to it that though I will probably never get married, I at least have that thing that we’re told in our society women should have – a big, shiny ring for your hand. I haven’t the heart to tell him that in my line of work, I won’t be able to wear the ring everyday – the mold, dirt, and chemicals associated with archival preservation make such an ornament impractical. I’ll wear my ring to family events, to show what it really means to me is the tacit, unspoken acceptance that my Grandfather has given me for a life very different from the traditional expectations of Southern women. His unspoken acceptance for the path I’ve chosen in life means more to me than he probably knows, because we’ll never speak of things in such a way.

My Grandfather is the last of the good ol’ boys, and he won’t speak to women regarding matters of money or anything he considers inappropriate. But he loves me, and he made sure that I know it, and it made me so happy and sad at the same time that sat down in the middle of my living room when I got that ring and had a big old girly cry.

Years ago I chose education over a domestic life, and at every turn I've put "achievement" over more comforting personal happiness. This strategy of comfort denial has put me exactly where I thought it would: I have two degrees, a killer resume, and I work for one of the best research library systems in the world. Maybe it's not to far a stretch to say that what lies at the heart of my delimma in the choice between Boston and Atlanta is simply the choice between commercial success and a life of more complex struggles. But if I structure the argument that way, what choice can I make but the one that will truly pay off in the end?