The Bonds of Love (Bands Optional)

About four months after our wedding day, my husband lost his ring. He said he thought it might have slipped off at work -- it had always been a little loose -- and that perhaps after drying his hands in the bathroom he might have tossed both ring and paper towel in the trash. I was a little disturbed by his nonchalance, especially since he'd never wanted to wear a ring in the first place, and I wondered if he'd "lost" it on purpose.

I asked if he'd put up a note in the bathroom or wherever, just in case someone found the ring.

He sighed and said he thought it would be "a little bit sissy" putting up a sign asking about a lost ring.

I didn't understand the logic, but then after four months of marriage, I was starting to realize that little about this guy made sense.

When he lost his cellphone he made quite an effort trying to retrieve it, I countered. One would have thought he'd do the same for something as precious as a wedding ring.

"I didn't put up a note looking for my cellphone," he said curtly.

"Fine." I shrugged. Much as it bothered me, I wasn't going to continue along the downward spiral our discussions had more frequently been taking, where nothing was ever resolved, where each of us eventually was defeated by the futility of arguing with someone who was always right.

For months, we danced around in an uneasy game of chess in which one of us was always trapped in checkmate. Then one day I decided not to wear my engagement and wedding rings. It wasn't as bold a move as it appeared -- I just took them off to clean them one day and never put them back on.

It was weeks before he noticed but when he did, he was annoyed.

"You have to at least wear your engagement ring," he said. "Do you know how much I spent on it?"

"And that's what makes it important?"

He didn't answer, but after a few moments of silence he suggested we sell it so we could buy something that would at least be used. The proposal left me speechless. To me, the significance of the engagement ring had been the sentiment supposedly behind it; to him, it was tied up in the money spent.