Box of Rocks

The real test is who can hold on to it.

Great Uncle Edward’s great-grandmother Lady Cealy brought the ruby brooch to America after fleeing Ireland with—legend has it--a handsome and terribly charming Irish peasant. Subsequent generations managed to pass it down but after Edward and his wife died, we found no trace of it.  Perhaps one of the nine Florida nurses providing round-the-clock care for my great aunt took it home--she had already given one of them all the furs. Or had the nurses threatened her and the brooch been part of an extortion scheme? Or was its disappearance my great aunt’s revenge for my uncle’s gift to my mother? Maybe my great aunt had so many jewels one fewer didn’t matter to her. The bottom line is that it was lost, the love-link broken. Traditionally, opals promise good luck, exactly what you need most to keep a jewel in the family. My secret wish to whomever inherits it is that the opal also encourage ambition, for we would still be stirring rock soup if daughters did not outstrip mothers for many of those generations.