Some moments arrive so quietly that we almost miss them. Yet years later, we realise they became part of the story of our lives. This was one of those moments.
“Come in, Mr Roberts. I’m ready for your PET scan and CT,” the radiologist called.
We had been sitting in the waiting room together, as we have sat together through so many things over the years — appointments, decisions, moments neither of us ever imagined we would face when we first began our life together.
“No metal on you?” she asked.
Together we emptied his pockets. Watch, keys, phone, wallet, coins — small, everyday things that suddenly seemed so ordinary in the face of what lay ahead.
Then her eyes fell to his wedding ring.
He looked down for a moment. Just long enough. And before he could decide, I stood, crossed the floor, and took his hand.
“I’ll keep it safe, dear man,” I said softly, slipping the ring from his finger and placing it on my own.
I sat in the waiting room for two and a half hours while he underwent his scans. Time moved slowly, the way it does when you are waiting for something you cannot control. Again and again, I found myself reaching for the ring, feeling its familiar weight beside my own wedding band.
His ring.
A broad gold band shaped like a buckle. His mother had made it for him in 1967. It was the fashion then. He had laughed when he first wore it, telling me he was now “buckled” to me for life.
And like so many small things we say when we are young, it had turned out to be true.
As I sat there, memories came quietly. Not in great dramatic sweeps, but in small, gentle moments. The absurdity of the Honeymoon Game, where it had all begun. The feeling of our hands held tightly when we were just twenty-three and twenty-four boarding the flight that carried us far from everything we knew. Arriving in Australia in 1969 with four dollars each in our pockets, and nothing except hope, courage… and a deep, unspoken certainty that we had each other.
We had no idea what life would ask of us. We only knew we would face it together.
When he sat beside me again, he didn’t ask for the ring. He had forgotten.
So I kept it.
The next morning, as always, he rose before me. A cup of tea appeared beside the bed. Pillows were adjusted carefully behind my back. These small acts, repeated over years, carry more love than any grand gesture ever could.
I took his hands in mine and asked him to look at them. He did, puzzled.
His fingers had grown thinner now. The weight he had lost in his body had found its way there, too. The ring would no longer sit securely. It would slip. It might be lost.
“Is something missing?” I asked gently.
He looked at me. “What is it?” he said.
I held up my hand.
Two rings.
Nestled together.
And then he smiled. That dear, familiar smile. And pulled me into the warmest embrace.
“That is where the ring shall stay,” he said quietly.
“For the rest of your life.”
We simply sat there smiling, two rings resting together on one hand. Nearly sixty years earlier we had promised to walk through life side by side. Somehow, without either of us ever planning it, those two rings had found their way home.
Now, as we stand in the last chapter of our lives, there is one question that quietly accompanies us. We seldom speak of it. We don’t have to.
Who will leave first?
Who will be the one to walk the rest of the road alone?
It is the only part of our story we cannot write together.
Everything else… we already have.
And perhaps, in the end, that is what love really is.
Not perfection.
Not certainty.
Simply choosing each other.
Again and again.
Two rings.
One heart.
This essay is part of my continuing memoir reflections, The Long Road of Love, where I explore the ordinary moments that have shaped nearly sixty years of marriage.
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This post was previously published on medium.com.
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Photo credit: Ashley Smith On Unsplash
