Merry-Go-Rings

When I was about fourteen, I went through this phase where I started wearing tremendous amounts of rings. I took my little wallet down to my local mall and wiggled my way into Claire’s and bought a whole treasure trove of ridiculously cheap rings, and I loaded up my fingers like there was no tomorrow. At the time, wearing a bunch of rings was not a trend. It was not anything. I got the idea because I’d was watching Disney’s Hunchback of Notre Dame with my little sister and I took notice of Claude Frollo wearing multiple rings and looking super-slick like only a true Disney villain can.

I should really make an entire post about style inspiration derived from movie villains, Disney and otherwise. Villains are chic. I think it’s an undeniable fact of life. There’s something about being the bad guy in a movie that often has the power to make a fellow (or a lady) look utterly stylin’. Over the years, I’ve taken a lot of style cues from movie villains. I’m not ashamed to say Frollo is the root of my love of rings.

But honestly, my rings have gotten pushed to the back of my jewelry box over the years. I threw out a lot of them – the original bunch WERE cheap finds from Claire’s, after all, and they were green and misshapen beyond belief. And then I forgot about my love affair with rings. Which is tragic. So, rings, if you’re listening, I want you back. I want to bring the fire and passion back into our relationship. I still remember that day when fourteen-year-old me was standing in line at Claire’s explaining to my mother that it was all Frollo’s fault that I was spending so much money on rings. I could practically sing an Adele song to you, oh rings.

In less dramatic words, I’ve decided to bring rings back into my life. And it’s about time, because nowadays, I’m seeing a lot of people doing the multiple-rings thing. It’s all over Pinterest! It’s all over everything – especially people’s fingers! Even my own Miss Edie has been in on the trend lately! I like to smirk to myself and tell myself that I was totally there first, even though it’d be ridiculous if I really thought I was the first human being to put on a lot of rings. I mean, we all know Frollo had the rings first. I copied HIM.

There’s a lot of things I love about multiple rings. First of all, it’s a fun way to use all of your rings at once. No ring left behind! They all get a chance to shine and breathe the fresh air and get displayed on your lovely hands. It’s also completely unnecessary, and kind of excessive. And while I’ve been loving and experimenting with black-and-white minimalism lately, it’s no secret to anyone who knows me that I love extravagance in all areas. I love gaudy things, and things that are over-the-top. A hand laden down in rings makes me think of medieval queens and Roman emperors. As far as jewelry goes, rings (especially big fat costume-jewelry-type rings) have huge personalities. I love it. So today, I took a deep dive into my jewelry storage and pulled out all of my rings.

OH, BOY. I can feel my passion coming back full-force already.

I think a big part of my love for rings is that they’re a great way to show off your personality. Everyone knows that old saying about how a picture is worth a thousand words. I view rings as little pictures all over your fingers, telling the world exactly who you are. You can display all your style influences and favourite colours in micro-form on your fingers! How wonderful is that.

And by the way, when you blow a kiss while wearing seventeen billion rings, it’s 100% more glam than with bare fingers. Trust me.

Another great thing about rings is that they can be amazing conversation pieces. Each one has a story. It’s almost like keeping notes on your hands of things you can talk about and topics you can discuss. And in my opinion, the more interesting anecdotes you have to your name, the better. There’s nothing more fun than being the one with a great story to tell, and believe it or not, your jewelry can help you out in that area.

On my left hand, my faux ruby ring was a Christmas gift from my mother, my laurel leaf ring is a homage to my love of Ancient Roman history and aesthetic,  my delightfully gaudy fake emerald is from the gift shop of this place where you can tour a real gold mine in Georgia,  my opal ring was the first thing I ever purchased from American Eagle, my elephant ring used to be my mother’s, and needed some serious TLC before it was ready to shine again, and my intricate gold snake ring was a nineteenth birthday gift from a friend who I write with all the time. Then on my right hand: my big wrought-iron-esque ring was one of the few original rings I got from Claire’s when I was fourteen that has stood the test of time, my amber ring was sent to me from Spain by my aunt who lives in Madrid, my little snake knuckle ring was a stocking stuffer that I wore while I was in the hospital for a serious neck infection on Christmas 2010, my gold ring with the oval stone in the middle is actually a MOOD ring and changes color, my delicate amethyst ring used to belong to a friend’s mother, my silver Celtic knot ring was three dollars on clearance at Boscov’s, my big geode ring was purchased during a shopping spree with Edie, my spoon ring was ordered from a catalog at one of those home jewelry parties, and my emerald and crystal pinky ring is part of a mother-daughter set I got when I was ten.

See how many stories you can wear on your fingers? There’s so much you can learn about my life just from my rings, and I’m sure the same fact applies to other people’s rings as well. Which is why I’m super-curious as to what YOUR favourite rings look like, and I want to know if any of you are into layering up your rings like ever so many glittering finger wonders. Maybe I should start some kind of a fortune-telling service where I make predictions about the person just based on their rings. Wouldn’t that be fun?

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