Jewelry

Our 8th anniversary is approaching, and my husband has suggested that he buy me a piece of jewelry that I pick out. My first thought: "I'd rather get a new iPod." I'm not sure what this says about me, if anything.

I have never been a big jewelry person. I like costume jewelry, you know - the kind that isn't locked up behind glass in department stores. But even the most expensive item in my jewelry box, the wedding ring I have literally outgrown, is only worth a couple hundred dollars.

Right before Rosalind was born, I read King Leopold's Ghost, a book about the Dutch colonization of what we now call Congo. Cutting off a hand was often punishment in the diamond mines. The picture of a Congolese man and his son both missing a hand still haunts me today. It wasn't just their missing hands that bothered me, but also the thought of what the father went through when his son's hand was cut off that disturbed me. Since then, diamonds have not only not appealed to me, but they have also come to represent something sinister to me. Unlike Kanye West who sings in "Diamonds from Sierre Leone" about his attempt to reconcile his desire for "bling" with his desire to do no harm to his African brethren, I don't desire diamonds at all.

This isn't to say that I'm not greedy and that I don't want things. That would be wholly dishonest. I want electronic gadgets, books, crafting supplies, a new bike, clothes, a kid-free vacation, and some salad plates. And a hybrid car, but that will have to wait a couple years.

The question I often consider is whether those kinds of images - of people with missing hands, of dead animals, of destroyed or polluted environments - exist behind the objects I so happily purchase: patterned paper, flip flops, Revlon lip gloss, printer cartridges. If I knew that was the case, would I stop buying these items? Could I know it? Would I choose to know it?

Meanwhile, I have to decide whether to or not I should take my husband up on his offer and avoid the diamond aisle altogether or to suggest a different route, like maybe a love letter. Or a bike. Or a new iPod.