7 reasons I gave my Fiancee a thimble instead of a ring

1. I'm from America and we don't really have a lot of diamonds here - I think it's silly to buy something that is supposed to symbolize so much from a country these feet have never traversed. I'm not saying Hondas aren't great cars or that Toblerone isn't smooth but they don't symbolize anything. I was able to find a silver thimble that was smithed in Baltimore after the Civil War - and was able to buy it from an antique shop in the town of my birth.

2. Lisa is about as rare and wonderful as it gets. Lisa IS a diamond. She deserved something unique...couldn't have a diamond walking around carrying a diamond on its finger.

3. Proverbs 31 describes the wife of noble character - I ask you to read that scripture and tell me which would be more becoming of that woman: a thimble symbolizing tender industry or a diamond ring symbolizing any number of stumbling stones.

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5. You don't build a house from the roof down. I think it is a gross tradition in this country that when a couple is just about to start out the man goes and blows 4 figures or more on a piece of jewelry. It might be a different story if I had oodles of disposable income which, like most Americans, I don't - or if I didn't have student loans which, like most men in my station, I do. I spent a good deal of money on the thimble and on an amethyst ring (mined in Maine and set in Barre, Vermont during the Depression) but not an amount that required a payment plan or a steadying gulp. Some people have intimated that I was like school on saturday (no class) by doing this but I think the soberminded man who knows the value of a dollar and seeks to marshall his resources wisely in a way that ensures the safety and comfort of his bride is a much more fitting way to take a knee and ask for that bride's favor.

6. The tradition in a wiser and more industrious America was to eventually cut the bottom off the thimble and size it to wear as a ring. Over time, as finances allowed, many would adorn the ring (typically with pearls). This tradition speaks to me so much more than starting off with the adornment - It is my pronkly held belief that a marriage that begins by acknowledging that it's humble and that asks both persons to carry their share of the water will be the marriage best primed to succeed - not just in the economic realm but also in the spiritual and interpersonal realms as well.

7. Despite many jewelers profuse claims diamonds are oftentimes harvested through cruel and inhumane practices that aggressively and greedily exploit and dehumanize individuals. I want no hand in that and don't want it on Lisa's hand.

*Job Tate - fellowship of the Octagon.