Jake had a thing about giving me jewelry. In his head, this is What Husbands Did. If one had a Wife, one got her Nice Things.

No matter that the wife in questions said, "I don't really like jewelry." No matter that she said, "I don't like to wear jewelry." No matter that she said, "At the very least, please don't ever get me anything gold."

"Happy anniversary," he'd say. "I know you don't like gold. I know you never wear jewelry. But I got this for you anyway."

So, I have this jewelry box, and it's filled with things. Gold things, mostly. Expensive things. Things I never wear. Things I didn't want in the first place. Things I have no use for.

And yet — two years later — I still have them.

Why? Is it because dealing with the process of appraisal and sale will take some effort? Is it because just the idea of yet another errand dealing with this divorce exhausts me?

Or is it that the idea of losing those presents is hard? Because — even though they speak so much to Jake's lack of understanding of me, lack of interest in what I liked and cared about — they were still given out of love.

So much pain is left when a marriage ends that it's hard to look back at what was good and happy without those memories being tainted, somehow, by all the hurt.

This could be grad school tuition, here in this box. This could be a vacation, or a couple of the cross-country plane tickets I'm burning through these days.

What will it take to open it up and take some action?