Stressing

I shouldn't have done it, quit cold turkey like that. I could have weaned myself away from - I don't know - opals, first, then gold, and then progressed to all jewelry. Why did I agree to a complete, global, abrupt fast?

It's my day off. I should be at the thrift stores, squinting through my loupe at the hallmarks, peering down the length of my arm to see how my potential find looks on my hand. Tomorrow ... okay, yes, I have a new class starting, but I could still go to a few yard sales, breath caught in anticipation of a bonanza, the electricity of potential horse-trading crackling in the air as I pull up then nonchalantly peruse a table full of pieces.

Oh, man I want to weep. I haven't had this much fun learning about - and hunting down - anything since I first started collecting milk glass. Yes, eventually I will become jaded (jade, sob!) as I did with milk glass (because I'm picky now, and I know 90% I see is shi - uh, common) but I'm still in the initial throes of infatuation, and my evil-mean parents just told me the boy is out of my life. Never mind that I was obsessing; it was love!

I keep telling myself that I'm becoming stronger, more appreciative, better equipped to resist the sparkle and get real bargains (and better pieces) with every day that passes. I recite "this is the right thing to do" like an effing mantra, that it's "prep work for an avalanche" of great finds. But I still feel as if someone stole Christmas.

Argh, cut it out! There's no crying in long-term, market-driven resource investment! I can do this!

I just need to shift focus.

Okay, um ... what's new? ... Well, Left Field is flying in with his partner for Thanksgiving. I'm actually over the moon about this, and no joke. I love having my children in proximity. Alaska is too far away to even be "prox". We'll do all the touristy things around here since (need a name for his partner!) has never been to this end of the world. Honestly, I'm such a geek that I adore doing all the sites (and sights). Add in a big holiday dinner, some board games, and a whole lot of chillin' and it's a recipe for a perfect week or so.

Oh, yeah, also - in desperation the other day, I took out my metal detector, a Big Lug classic present from several years ago. There really are a butt-load of blips, all over my yard. And since we're on top of an old farmstead, that could be not just cool but profitable, so I called our local utility ID place to come out and mark the lines. The nice lady got to the part about "reason for excavation" and I told her "treasure hunting." Silence. "I don't have a box for that," she said, "but it sounds like so much fun," and typed it in. I'll probably just be a bucket of nails richer by mid-September, but I'll sweat off a couple of pounds, aerate the lawn, and provide at least a moment's amusement for all the line-finders. Always, double- and triple-duty, right?

I'm planning the big trip, too. We leave a week from Tuesday. I need to contact everyone about Christmas and Hanukkah, too - which magazines to keep up, where sizes and tastes and trends are this year, all that good stuff. I'll have no end of possibilities for buying, and soon. Even jewelry - for other people.

Besides, I can still look at gems and platinum, I just can't buy it. (The Tiffany & Co. web site is always a good place for fasting addicts - can't afford much anyway) Plus, if it gets too bad, I'll just clean up what I have and, technically, end the drought.

But I don't think I'll need to. I can make it.

And I'll be sure to tell you what happens next.