The results are in, and it looks like 95% of the people that I’ve asked say that you can never give the same engagement ring twice. The other 5 percent are guys who have no girlfriends and therefore are not afraid to seem cheap. But why shouldn’t I be able to give the ring again?
Now I’m not going to say that I don’t understand that giving a gift you bought with someone else in mind to another person takes a little bit of the magic out of it. And I know that making this argument is just going to make me look cheap and bitter. But I’m only the latter! But, hey, I think I have a point here. When I gave the ring, I tried to “give myself” to her and she rejected that along with the ring, so no can I never “give myself” to anyone else? Am I tainted just like the ring? If I used to love someone else and now I have a new love, is that love somehow less? Why does the ring have to be linked to one person at a specific time in my life. What I’m trying to say is that I’m tying the ring not to the person but to my idea of loving someone. If you accept my love, then you accept the symbol of it. Maybe I’m thinking of it like a crown for a queen. When there’s a new queen they don’t go out and buy a new crown for her to wear. They break out “the royal jewels” Well in my life, this is the royal jewel and besides my car, it’s the most expensive thing I own.
Also this whole concept doesn’t apply for rings that you didn’t buy. If there’s a ring that’s been in the family for a while and you give it to your first fiancee, then I think you have the right to ask for it back and give it to the next one. That doesn’t sound like such a far fetched idea to me. I don’t even think that the person who’s ring is was originally has to be dead or anything, they could just give it to you. is that some kind of loophole? If your first fiancee dies, is that better or worse to give it again? So why does buying the ring with your own money make it different. Is it the process? Is it the fact that when she thinks of where I got the ring that she’s going to think of me at the store all happy that I was going to marry someone else? If I give you my grandmothers ring, do you think of someone pulling it off her dead finger?
Sorry about the morbid imagery. What I’m talking about here is symbolism. Maybe I won’t give the ring again ( and I probably won’t because no woman is going to be that persuaded by this essay) But I should be able to. Just like we should be able to wear rings made out of cultures of each others bone tissue or a silver cast toy ring as an engagement ring. But what your really concerned about is appearance. “What is everybody else going to think?” What’s the first thing someone asks when a girl says that she just got engaged? “let me see the ring!” Now why do people say that. Well their judging the man of course. Is he rich? Did he spend a lot of money? How much does the he REALLY care? I think there should be some kind of thought behind the ring. When I bought the last one, I spent a lot of money, too much money for a young man to realistically spend on something like that. I knew what she wanted and I got it. I think If I ever do that again, I’m going to make it mean something to both of us. A little secret that we both can share. and NO the secret’s not going to be, he bought it for another woman
Maybe here’s what I’m trying to say. After you realize that there’s no secondary market for diamonds outside the diamond world, you start to see that diamonds aren’t valuable. They aren’t a good investment, they’re just expensive. Now there is a difference between expensive and valuable. Diamonds are a one time purchase, once you have it, it becomes worthless. Or maybe it becomes sentimental, only valuable to you. So why would I even want to give that ring again, It’s worthless? Why not give something else that really means something? Well that’s option A in the Mark Schumaker plan of life. Option B is that ring is worth $2500 to me. Cause that’s what I paid for it.
The stupid thing about this all is, Nobody’s ever going to listen to me about this. Everybody wants to be iced out. Everybody is falling for it, diamonds are the biggest scam of all and you’ve bought it hook line and sinker Bling Bling.
Diamonds are a wars best friend
PBS show about synthetic diamonds
Is a diamonds price the measure of it’s true value?
Ask METAfilter: Advice on selling a diamond
Ask METAfilter: Selling an engagement ring