Something Lost and Found

In 1980, when I worked the 3-to-11 p.m. shift at the Hartford Hospital lab, I slipped a $20 bill into my lab coat pocket. My white elastic-waist pants had no pockets, so I kept many things in my lab coat. While pulling something else out, my $20 bill fell to the ground unnoticed. At dinner time, I had to borrow money from a friend.

I never found the $20 bill. The good fortune of finding it is someone else’s story. But that night, after 11, as I walked through the hospital lobby to the covered entrance where my husband was waiting to pick me up (we had only one car), something shiny on the ground caught my eye. It was a thin gold ring in the shape of a snake, tail lying next to the head at the front of the ring.

Photo by The New York Public Library on Unsplash

If I hadn’t lost the $20 that day, I might have tried harder to find the ring’s owner. The security guards at the desk said there was no lost-and-found for such things. And the coincidence of losing and finding on the same day made me think the ring was mine. It fit perfectly on my right ring finger. I had one gold ring on each hand; one band was wide, one was narrow. I was born in the Year of the Snake.

I wore that ring for fourteen years, all through the decision to go to medical school, all through my medical training. It was one of the rings I removed to scrub before going into the OR to observe. The two ends of the ring were not soldered together, so sometimes it caught on things, got stretched and bent, got pushed back into shape. Eventually, the back of the ring broke. I still have the two pieces in a jewelry box.

Many times, I wondered whether the snake on the ring was a caduceus, the physician’s symbol. Was it a sign to pursue the path of medicine? If so, it was a sign that came and then broke when it was no longer needed. I finished my training and started on a new path with its own signs and messages. To face the new challenges, I needed integrity and courage.

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Thanks for reading,
Deborah