I was an only child for a long time. And even then, I've never lived in the same house as my little sister. This doesn't make her any less my sister, but the behavior I'm about to talk about depends heavily on my childhood experience.
You might think my parents did a fantastic job, or you might think they were ludicrous, but as I child I truly thought I could do anything. I was convinced that if I tried hard enough that I could fly. I also thought my mother was from a long line of witches. She and her sisters had a very unique mysticism about them... it was beautiful and captivating, and something that I assumed would just start up one day, like puberty.
So, I was probably in kindergarten and light up shoes were the shit. I begged for a pair. Granted, being an only child, I didn't beg long, but I really wanted a pair. So my mom got me a pair. They were white with, what I'm remembering as, glittery shoe laces. The heel, when you stepped, would flash. I don't remember the color. I wore them religiously. I wore them constantly. I remember trying to sleep in them.
I lost one shoe. I kept the other shoe for many years after I could have possibly shoved my foot into them, but it never returned.
I assumed for a long time that it was some type of portal to magical rune that would allow me to join the sisterhood that my mother and her sisters (aunts, grandmothers for all I know). Yes. It was a vivid imagination. Yes. I did jump off of my monkey bars only to be shocked when I sprained my ankle instead of taking flight over the neighborhood.
The resolution: My dad remarried after he divorced my mom. My dad, much like a certain someone else I've come to love, will exercise his control over his environment (when he feels like he doesn't have any control at all) by cleaning. When my dad was remarried he threw things away all the time. He was stressed by clutter. So he would throw away toys, clothes, and actual trash every weekend. The problem with this behavior was more evident with his second wife because they were even more poor with 5 kids in a 2 bedroom house; so we started running out of clothes, and "heirlooms", that were obviously cheap dollar store items went missing.
For the record, my adult brain says that my dad threw away the shoe accidentally; without it's pair. Not that he would hesitate to throw away a new pair of shoes left in the wrong place, but that the main error was that he left one behind.
A small smidgeon of me still wonders if it's in the back of the closet, whirring with magic. Like I could touch it, and be taken to a place where I would find all the answers to the confusing things that have happened since the year of the LA gear light up shoes to present.
2. My Claddaugh
Fastforward. I was in the 8th grade. My dad's second marriage has fallen apart. Well, it never really fused. But, life was finding a certain calm. My grandmother and I were thick as theives. Where she went I went. For most practical purposes I lived with her from 7th grade through my senior year of high school. I don't remember the holiday, but she gave me an Avon ring with a lab generated emerald in the middle. It was a crown resting on two hands, that reached out to hold the stone in the middle. I didn't think much of it when I got it. I think I just put it away for a few years. And then I read a story, or heard about what a Claddaugh was and went digging. I put it on when I was 14 and kept it on my hand until I was around 21. The ring was turned facing inward. My heart was taken. We went to Yosemite, and my fingers started to swell (just like they did when he proposed!). I took the ring off and put it in my pocket at Inspiration Point. When we got back down, the ring was gone. I cried. I told Nana and she didn't even blink. It wasn't a big deal to her. I don't even know if she knew I wore it.
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