As I sat in front of the mirror, all dressed but for the final touch of perfection for my bridal look, I stared at it. Sitting proudly on my dressing table, it stared right back, as if giving me a reassuring smile. As my nervousness melted away, I dressed my lips in a beautiful smile, picked it up and slid it on. I felt complete even as a 127 years’ of an ever-growing love package rested on my wrist. A bangle that hasn’t just been in my family for generations but reverberated with stories that shall be told over and over for years to come.
Image source: Velvetcase.com
As I sat there looking at my own bridal reflection, it came back to me. My first recollection of the bangle that adorned me on my special day. I was hardly five years old when I saw the sparkly thing on my grandmother’s wrist. We were spending the summer with her and as was custom, each meal was to be followed by storytelling. Dragging my reluctant li’l brother along just so grandma would feel more pressured to tell me of princes and princesses, I’d spend hours listening to her stories of how the prince and the princess would always live happily ever after. On all such occasions, her zest for storytelling would reflect bright in the radiance of her resplendent smile and the glimmer of the bangle that sat proudly on the hand she’d use to animate her stories! I’d come to love the summers we spent with her- she had a way of bringing stories to life, a way no book or reading could ever emulate. As the years passed by, I found myself returning to grandma- asking to hear stories, more real, more her.
Image source: Velvetcase.com
It was during one of these visits that I learnt that the bright bangle I’d come to regard a part of my old lady’s odd sculpture of a hand wrapped in skin parchment actually hid a million stories underneath. The bangle had come to be hers as a gift from grandpa- who had, by self-admission, told her that he was more nervous to ask his mother for her bangle than he ever was of popping the big question to grandma. As a legacy that passed on from my great-grandmother to my grandmother, the old beloved heirloom (which my great-grandmother had received from her own mother-in-law) simply came to play a new part in my grandma’s love story. It stayed with her for all the years after- lining her hand when she cradled dad and Aunt Jen, when she brought them up with what dad called the most non-strict hand ever, when she gave them away in marriage and now, when she told her kids’ kids stories from the life I’d soon see as my favorite ‘happily-ever-after’ ever!
In all my life, I’d never seen her take off the priceless piece of jewelry, rich not in precious stones but eternal emotions that held a distinctive charm from the past, in the present, for the future! This was until she left us so she could be where she belonged- with grandpa. If we were all allowed that one thing we love on earth, I had no doubt she’d take her bangle along- so she could ask grandpa to be with her forever again, just the way he asked her to be his. But since that, for some reason, is a strict no-no, my grandma gave away her prized possession to my mom- hoping she’d pass it on to her favorite grandkid when it was due.
Image source: Velvetcase.com
Only I didn’t know the day would come so quickly. Still a teenager when grandma passed, I’d come to see the bangle as grandma’s living nominal on mom. She’d wear it all the time, just like grandma – making it a witness to the life she lived and all the love she shared. I’d watch her take it off only once every year- so it could be polished and made anew- to keep the glory of the hundreds of stories it nurtured alive!
Today, as my mom took not-so-much-a-breather in the whirr of scurrying emotions she felt as a mom giving away her daughter, she parted with the bangle she knew was rightfully mine. She placed the bangle atop a box she whipped out from the closet and placed it on my drawer. She said it had a note for me from grandma and that I should open it only when I was ready to leave the room. She came close to me, held me like she did when I was a child and told me she loved me. And suddenly, my world shrunk into her. I couldn’t say I loved her too because I felt I wasn’t ready to leave her, just yet. Maybe I never would be. But as the mother who always read my thoughts even when I didn’t find the words to convey them, she kissed me and told me that I’d always be with her and she’d always be with me. I knew that was true.
Unable to find it in my heart to get decked in the jewels that lay on my table for hours afterward, I finally started to become the bride I had dreamt I would, one day, be. As I sat in front of the mirror, all dressed but for the final touch of perfection for my bridal look, I stared at it. Sitting proudly on my dressing table, it stared right back, as if giving me a reassuring smile. As my nervousness melted away, I dressed my lips in a beautiful smile, picked it up and slid it on.
Image source: Velvetcase.com
‘Honey, you ready?’ came a voice from outside the room.
I took the box in my hand and popped it open.
‘Because this is about your happily-ever-after, dear,’ said the note from grandma. I wiped away a silent tear as my smile grew twice in size. I got up from my seat and walked towards the door. I was ready- because this, indeed, was about my happily-ever-after!
Featured image source: Pixabay, under Creative Commons License
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