The missing link: A birthday gift for the ages

My son turned 16 this week, and my mom (and dad) came through with a surprise none of us expected.

Sweet sixteen gifts have become something of a ritual in our family. But I’d forgotten all about it until my mom gifted Julian the silver bracelet from my dad. The gold necklace was a gift from my grandmother on my 16th birthday.

When I turned 16, my grandmother gave me her engagement ring string on a fine gold chain necklace. 

It was the life-changing gift she received when she was 16 and a high school student in Springfield, Missouri. This was 1946, just after World War II ended and her would-be husband’s basketball career at Missouri State University was beginning. She went on to become a basketball wife, a dental assistant, a widow, a town treasure, and a doting grandmother to five. 

Gaga died in 2017 at the age of 88.

It was a sweet gift, I knew at the time, but one that felt kind of irrelevant in my world. I loved her deeply, but I didn’t really care about jewelry. I wasn’t planning on getting married anytime soon, and the whole idea of rites and rituals — especially around a virtuous “sweet sixteen” — felt like a burden to carry, not a tradition to celebrate.

After I moved away from Missouri in 2006, the necklace sat in a toiletry kit that traveled with me to Austin, where I soon had Julian in 2007. 

My stint on “What Not to Wear” in 2008 is what finally changed my mind about wearing the ring necklace. The makeover gave me the willingness to draw attention to myself with something shiny and delicate. 

Gaga got engaged in 1946 with this ring, which she gave me on my 16th birthday.

My growth as a mom, who was suddenly aware of the quickly passing generations, is what nudged me to start wearing it each time I wanted to feel connected to Gaga. On the days of big speaking engagements, or a ladies’ luncheon at the country club, or a trip to Sweden to see where her grandmother was born, I’d clasp that tiny latch at the nape of my neck and feel the warmth of her presence come over me. 

I don’t have such a talisman from my dad’s mom, Grandma Shirley, who, at 16, was living in Kansas. She didn’t have a ring on her finger, but she carried a baby in her belly.