Who are we fooling?

If I may use the term, one of our young adult Ruah Woods "groupies" sent me this song. She said she found it reminiscent of John Paul II's pre-papal play, "The Jeweler's Shop." How true! As I listened to it, I kept thinking of these lines:

 "I thought then about the wedding rings,

which we both, Stefan and I,

wore on our fingers.

One day, on the way back from work,

passing by the jeweler’s shop,

I thought I might as well

sell this ring of mine.

(Stefan probably would not have noticed –

I had almost ceased to exist for him .

Whether he was unfaithful to me I do not know,

since I took no interest in his life either.

He was indifferent to me.

I suppose after office hours he went to play cards,

and after drinking he would come home quite late,

without saying a word, or with some casual remark,

to which as a rule I replied with silence.)

So this time I decided to go in.

The jeweler examined the workmanship, weighed the

            ring

for a long time in his fingers and looked

into my eyes.  For a while he was reading

the date of our wedding

engraved inside the ring.

Again he looked into my eyes, put the ring on the

            scales …

then said, “This ring does not weigh anything,

the needle does not move from zero

and I cannot make it show

even a milligram.

Your husband must be alive –

in which case neither of your rings, taken separately,

will weigh anything – only both together will register.

My jeweler’s scales

have this peculiarity

that they weigh not the metal

but man’s entire being and fate .”

Ashamed, I took the ring back

and left the shop without a word

-- I think, though, that he followed me with his eyes.

---

.