(Which makes it 5 years, 4 months, and 17 days so yes this counts.) We've been through a lot together. I suppose I first have some apologies to make to you. You were once part of a set. There were matching earrings, but such fanciness was soon lost. (I noticed one's disappearance in the Oakcrest High School cafeteria, and after a few minutes of frantic searching I gave up and relegated the other to my doomed collection of mistmatched earrings.) You came on a specific chain, one that was dainty and innocent and cute. ...And I broke it. Long story short, I haven't always treated you with the utmost care. But, pendant, I want you to know that you have always had my love and my respect. I want you to remember the days when I didn't take you off for months at a time, even to sleep, even to shower. I want you to remember how I would only buy silver jewelry so that whatever else I wore could match you. And now that I have diversified, and other pendants share your chain...don't think I have lost any love for you. You and your giver will always hold a special place in my heart, even if I don't brandish that spot by dangling you between my breasts everyday. I promise you that regardless of whatever battles I'll have to fight to keep your company, I will never lose you. You mean too much to me.
It's almost eerie to me how closely my relationship with you, pendant, mirrors my relationship with the person who gave you to me. He had just lost his footing as the primary person in my life then, and of all the gifts I opened at my 16th birthday party, this was the only gift to make me gasp. It was the only gift I couldn't bear to be parted from; I remember lifting my hair to let him put you on me and giving him a hug that said I wanted to swallow him whole. And I wore you faithfully nearly every day for over two years, until J gave me a ring on a strand and asked me to replace it. I shouldn't have, but someone wanted me for the first time in a long time and I said yes. And after that short-lived...I still don't like saying mistake, but I'm at a loss for another word...I went back to wearing you almost daily until friends (aka my fashion police freshman year) asked why I never wore my other necklaces. Suddenly I felt silly wearing the same necklace every day, so I diversified. I shopped. I...changed.
And as I changed, I felt my relationship with your giver change. We fought more and more. We stopped being honest with each other. We gave incredibly serious consideration to calling it quits forever...but we could never quite go through with it, and even when it seemed like we were I never hurt you, pendant. I never threw you away or even across the room. You just sat in my jewelry box, winking at me when the light hit you, and reminding me that what he and I have is a gem, and no matter how much it changes, gets strung from different chains or worn with varying regularity, it will always be one of my life's greatest treasures. It's no longer hard to take you off, pendant, like it was way back when, but putting you on always feels somehow right, like the weight of you and the way you fall is just perfect. You are comfortable, like a favorite sweater or a best friend. That will never change.
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| 5 birthdays later you're both still right here with me. That's how I want it to always be. |
Maya
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