The Return of the Moon

For approximately 18 years, I wore an ivory moon and star necklace from the Renaissance Faire around my neck. (Most people who worked at the Ren Faire for any length of time had one of these necklaces from Pale Moon Creations--it was kind of a secret Faire Folk's ID badge.) For most of those 18 years, I wore it every day, 24/7. I didn't take it off at all, not to sleep, not to shower--I even wore it when I was in the hospital through my cancer experience (I took it off for each radiation treatment and then put it right back on aftewards), and pinned inside my dress at my wedding.

I bought it the second year I worked at the Ren Faire, as part of a sort of "friendship pact" with my dear friends Galila and Linda, later to be known as my "moon sisters". Linda bought a waxing faceless crescent, I had the full moon with a face, and Galila had the waning crescent with a face--each one different, but connected to the others. My moon sisters eventually stopped wearing theirs, except occasionally--but I kept wearing mine daily. Right around the time Eli was born, I stopped wearing it exclusively (I would sometimes take it off in order to wear another necklace), but I still wore it quite a bit (it was my default jewelry, like my wedding ring or my second hole earring hoops--there unless I took it off for some specific reason). Here's a picture of me wearing it (it's a vastly unflattering picture but it was the first one I could find where you can get a decent look at the necklace itself):

The ivory it was made out of (and yes it was estate ivory, in case you were wondering or starting to tsk tsk me) had yellowed where it had touched my skin, acquiring that coveted patina of age. The gloss and polish of the original piece was faded, and you could see fine lines showing in it, the original tusk's grain. The face's carved features had begun to soften and blur, becoming less distinctly chiseled as the ivory wore. It was one of my most precious personal possessions, my talisman--both a reminder of my years at Faire (and the many meaningful moments in my life there), and a personal symbol I related to on many levels. Josh, after we met at Faire, got an ivory sun necklace which he also wore all the time. (We had to special order it in ivory because they'd stopped making them in ivory a few years after I'd bought mine--they switched to bone, horn and other, non-organic substances.) The summer I was pregnant with Eli, I bought an ivory star necklace for him, and wore it together with my own moon and star necklace in preparation for the time he'd be old enough for me to pass it on to him. (I'm wearing that one as I type this, as a matter of fact.)

You may have noticed by now that this story has so far all been told in the past tense. That's because last January, when we went to Hawaii with my parents, I lost my moon necklace, somewhere between the condo and the beach and the condo again. I searched for it (in vain), and finally had to comfort myself with the fantasy that it had come off in the ocean and was even now being washed out to sea, perhaps to be buried in the sand somewhere for a future beachcomber to find someday when the land changed. Even though it wasn't a 24/7 part of my life anymore, I was really, really, really bummed about losing it--I can't even quite express how it made me feel. It truly was like losing a piece of myself, a piece of my own history, almost a piece of my own body.

So this last August, when we went to visit the Ren Faire at Stafford Lake, I went to the Pale Moon booth and talked with Heidi, the super nice proprietor who I always visited every time to at least re-string my necklace, and placed a special order for a new ivory full moon and star necklace. It wouldn't be the same, of course, but I felt like I really wanted a replacement. Months went by, and my polite and reasonable email and in-person queries were met with equally polite and reasonable reasons why the special order wasn't done yet. I almost gave up and bought a non-ivory one, but it seemed important to get as exact a replacement as possible (and frankly, elephant sympathies or no, I love ivory, I admit it.) So I was without my moon necklace for almost exactly one year, when out of the blue earlier this week, I got an email from Heidi saying "it's done! I'm mailing it to you!".

So today, I am wearing my new moon necklace. And I love it. It's slicker, shinier, thicker and gleamingly whiter than the old one--there are innumerable tiny differences that are clear to me every time I rub the moon face between my fingers or look at it in the mirror. But it's so very comforting and pleasing to me to have a moon face and star back around my neck. I feel back in balance. I'm so glad I have it before the birth of this next baby too--for some reason, I feel like I just really wanted the talisman back before I went through labor again. And now I have it. I hope this one lasts for at least another 18 years, or until I'm ready to move on, at least.