Skipping Mordor in favor of Dawn

The other night I took off a ring I've worn for 15 years.  There's no dramatic, cathartic story behind the removal. It was all a rather practical matter.  And no hobbits were harmed in the process.

It's a ring I inherited from my father.  I'm the fourth owner.  Early owners included my grandfather and an uncle.  All their initials are on the inside.

It hasn't left my finger in 10+ years.  Why?  My fingers (and the rest of me) got a little too big.  I put on some weight over the year and that secured the ring pretty well.  Recently it began to loosen up (along with my waist band) so I thought it might be possible to take it off.  I didn't try very hard though, until the other day.

I noticed my finger felt irritated under the ring.  It wan't intense pain, but it was definitely a "something's not right" feeling.  I don't know if something got caught under there, or if there was too much moisture or not enough or something else, but it wasn't right.  I rotated the ring 180 degrees for a few hours, and that seemed to help.  Later on, I developed a plan.

First, I soaked my hand in ice water for 10 minutes.  I figured that might contract the skin and it's related components enough to wiggle the ring off.  It may have helped; I'm not sure on that point.  

What ultimately brought success was the Dawn dish washing detergent.  I poured some on the finger and ring and massaged and rotated the ring around my finger.  I poured on more dish washing detergent and continued to massage.  Millimeter by millimeter I made progress.  After about 5 minutes of this the ring popped over my knuckle, as smooth as anything.  The whole experience turned out to be much less harrowing than I expected.

Here's how a normal finger looks.  This is my left hand.

And here is my right hand.  Can you tell where I wore the ring all those years?

It's now three days later and I still have the indentations at the base of my finger. I'm guessing I'll have those for a while.  I'm still getting used to how it feels to make a fist or grip the steering wheel.

I found the whole experience oddly fascinating.

The ring now safely rests in my jewelry box, along with a couple tie tacks, some small rocks, and about 40 French Francs.  I'll putt it back on in a few months to a year.  

Just as soon as a few more of those pesky pounds come off.