I dropped
out of high school at 17 years old. I
was living on my own at a young age. I
was a legal secretary, while I went to college, part-time. It took me seven years to get a degree that
way. I desperately wanted to be a
lawyer. I found myself, occasionally,
hanging out at a bar where all the lawyers went.
One night I
drank too much, and a lawyer drove me home.
I woke up in the morning and the first thing I remembered was I hadn’t
come home in my own car. I needed to
call a cab. It was a weekday. Just then I heard knock, knock, knock at my
door, and there stood Joel Stein, a lawyer, looking all spiffy in his suit. “I thought you would like a ride back to your
car.” I thanked him.
About a
dozen years later I was a lawyer. A
woman hired me to represent her with some issues pertaining to her husband’s
estate. Her husband was Joel Stein.
The widow
didn’t have much money. I don’t recall
there was much money in the estate. I
think she just had a couple issues. She
paid me, in part, with a ring. It was
Joel Stein’s mother’s wedding ring. It
had the couples’ initials inside, with a date, 1943. Joel Stein must have been a few years younger
than my Dad. I wore the ring a lot. I have very small fingers. I oftentimes wear rings over larger rings to
hold them in place.
About ten
years later I started looking at that ring and the voice inside my head told me
that ring wasn’t really mine. Joel Stein
had a daughter, not the daughter of the wife I represented. I am an avid genealogist and a treasurer of
heirlooms. It struck me as ridiculous I had
that ring.
I searched
through Joel Stein’s file and came across the daughter’s address, in another
state. I wrote her a letter asking if
she wanted the ring. I never heard from
her and the letter never came back. A
year or so later I sent a second letter, same result.
Then I got
on Facebook. One day I searched for Stacy
Stein Baker. I found her, in the state
where she was in the mid-1990s. I sent
her a message and asked if she was Joel Stein, the Fort Lauderdale lawyer’s,
daughter. I never got a reply. I still wore that ring all the time. I would look at it and think, “This isn’t
really yours. You’re safe-keeping it.” I have quite a few family heirlooms. I wear my grandmother’s wedding ring a
lot. My daughter is not into family history
like I am. I thought someday I will die and a family
member will look at this ring and wonder who it belonged too. Maybe they will make up a story. I will be shouting down from heaven, “It’s
Joel Stein’s mother’s wedding ring.”
On Sunday,
October 16th, 2016 I got a message from Stacy Stein Baker. She said she was Joel Stein’s daughter. How did I know her father? I jumped up from my computer and told my
boyfriend, “I just got a message I have been waiting for for years.” He knew the story about the ring. He asked if I was still going to give it to
her. I said yeah. I would miss it because it had been with me
for so long and I wear it all the time, but it’s not mine, nothing’s
changed. The ring really belongs to
Stacy.
Stacy was
ecstatic when I told her about the ring.
Yes, she wanted it. She didn’t
understand how that message I sent her from 2012 just popped up in her
in-box. I figure it went to spam. I don’t know how it left spam. She said she didn’t remember what the ring
looked like. I said like this
Stacy said that picture flooded her with memories of her grandmother in Fort Lauderdale.
I was
really busy this week, but I knew Stacy was waiting for the ring with baited
breath, so I took it to the post office on Wednesday. I told her it was guaranteed to be delivered
by 3 PM Friday, that’s the best the US Postal Service will do, but they have
insurance and I don’t think Fedex does.
I insured the ring and prayed I didn’t have to make a claim on the insurance, because that would ruin the whole thing.
Work has
been tough this week, but this afternoon up popped this picture
It sent chills through my body. Stacy asked if she could pay me back for the
postage. No, that would kind of ruin the
mitzvah, nickel and diming.
Seeing the ring on her finger makes me very happy.
Stacy told
me October 18th, was the 23rd
anniversary of her father’s death. She
said this was the first time in a long time she felt close to him. I really wonder about the timing and the
message popping up in her FB. The whole
story is so crazy. I am going to guess Stacy
was not close to her step-mother. I
never met the step-mother until she came to my office to retain me. She didn’t know I knew her husband. This story is not about an evil step-mother,
so please don’t pull that from it. If
the ring had not ended up with me it would have gone elsewhere. This story is about ethereal
serendipity. It’s a miracle I ended up
with the ring. Me, who has an affinity
for family history. I kept thinking Joel drove me home when I was drunk, and he
came back for me the next morning to get me to my car. The ring was not really mine, and now it’s
right where it belongs.
