On my way to deliver a workshop, I stepped into the wrong underground train yesterday. I had to go one stop back before getting on the right one. I was only five minutes late. Not too bad. Last week I got on a bus heading in the wrong direction in very heavy traffic and after quite a bit of confusion and plotting in snail speed, I ended up taking a much lengthier journey home. I also spill liquids over surfaces. Charity shop clothes I buy don’t quite work. They are the wrong colour, shape, size or length. Shoes arrive in the wrong size. As do the rings. We make them work by KS wearing his on the index finger of his right hand and mine is on the middle finger of the left.
We did a hand-fasting ceremony on 1 May 2007. This was incidentally the same date we recently heard about his prognosis. Back in 2007 we were on a Buddhafield team retreat. After KS came back into our tent during the night, he said: “I smell May blossom in the air. Let’s get hand fasted.” We did. I was delighted. We jumped over a broom stick under a big oak tree during a hilarious and magical ceremony on Buddhafield land in Devon. The whole gathering, including us, dressed in clothes from their dress-up trunks.
We were legally married during the winter solstice in 2011. The proposal came over breakfast. He suggested it at the table before putting a spoonful of porridge in his mouth. Let’s get married. And so we did. We were so pleased on the day of our very simple wedding. We never had rings. But a month ago I was talking to a friend who had been ring shopping with her fiancée. I told her I had wanted a ring but KS could not see himself wearing one. He just didn’t like wearing a ring. I felt it didn’t make sense for me to wear one if he didn’t. What it came down to was: I had wanted one, but didn’t push for it. I told KS this story when I came home. He said: let’s get ourselves some rings. And so we did. Unfortunately when they arrived yesterday we found they are slightly too big. I do not know how that happened. But we make do. And who cares it is on the wrong finger. There is no engraving on the inside, but on the outside there are radiating suns. Suns coming up and suns going down. This seems symbolic. And this seems to be what matters most. The thought of it. The gesture of it. The connection. All a bit clunky, but that also seems fitting.
