Pearls

Finally..I reached that age..wearing pearls

Pearls have always fascinated me..Mostly because of Gibran’s story

Said one oyster to a neighbouring oyster, “I have a very great pain within me. It is heavy and round and I am in distress.”

And the other oyster replied with haughty complacence, “Praise be to the heavens and to the sea, I have no pain within me. I am well and whole both within and without.”

At that moment a crab was passing by and heard the two oysters, and he said to the one who was well and whole both within and without, “Yes, you are well and whole; but the pain that your neighbour bears is a pearl of exceeding beauty.”

And then there was Cleopatra..

Pliny the elder wrote about the wager Cleopatra had with Marc Antony, that she could host the most expensive dinner party in the world.
She gave feast after feast, but it was just like every other feast and Marc Antony told her, your feasts were indeed nice, but anyone could give do the same..in other words he was asking her to pay up the wager.
Cleopatra asked her servant to bring a glass of wine ( probably red wine vinegar), took one of her earrings off, dropped the pearl earring,( not any pearl earrings..according to Pliny it was the biggest pearl ever found on earth and cost 10 million sesterces) in to the glass and drank it when the pearl dissolved, thereby hosting the most expensive feast ever!
The story continues that when she died, her other pearl earring was chopped in to half, so a pair of earrings could be made for the statue of Venus in Pantheon.

I kind of felt Pearls were to be worn when I am older..probably because Grace Kelly in the movie “rear window”.. She looked so elegant..

I enjoyed my hippie youth, wearing colourful dresses..and now I am enjoying my middle age.. single strand of pearl..black evening dress..and a glass of wine and a great company..

It is all good !

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