Oysters and Pearls

• My eyes spot a giant pearl, nesting in white gold.  It beams like an all knowing lunar orb,
• looking back as if it sees me. Am I an oyster or a pearl?  I wonder.  Advertised from an online
• jeweler, I choose the right size, 5.5. I’m really bad about jewelry, losing it, breaking it. I picture
•  wearing it at tradeshows, with French tips, when the appearance of my hands matters. Price
• differentiates between natural pearls and cultured pearls. Of three tons of harvested oysters,
•  maybe three or four contain this rarity. A string of natural pearls costs hundreds of thousands.
• Cultivated pearls require  help from a farmer by insertion of an irritating nucleus into the
• oyster—to replicate the  precious symbol of sacrifice. I hadn’t given it much thought
• before. Aren’t all pearls cultivated?  Fresh water, or salt—natural or cultured?  Doesn’t any
• oyster work to rid itself of a parasite that doesn’t belong? A deeper thinker may even accept
• that the foreign body is one to be embraced and reckoned. To not be afraid of the pain, face it
• head on—look it in the eye. So, natural oysters go along, skirted by the tides, doing their jobs,
•  and only a few are chosen to endure a special process—that of crafting a jewel.  How are these
• oysters the lucky ones?  Is there some chemistry in the ocean that decides—this one can handle
• it—some marine biology dictating a capability that other oysters don’t have? An oyster is a
• small lapidary, churning and yearning for the end—resulting in peace, solace… resolution. The
•  oyster itself polishes a pearl, because it’s worthy of courage. Fearlessness that turns sorrow to
• joy—pain to relief—fear to love.
•  
• I read on to find that there is a second natural oyster that doesn’t receive such glory. Its’
• vocation is of a lower calling.  It exists to serve the environment outside of itself, cleansing
• marshland, purifying ocean water, never producing a pearl. It doesn’t lap in a Neptune palisade
•  laboring royal in carved ivory splendor. A bottom feeder, it compares to guys on the lower
• deck of a luxury liner, sweating beside boilers, working the oars. I’m impressed by both types,
• like people in a caste system.  Synchronism orders a world where facades of kings and queens
• belie agonizing burdens and impoverished folks seemingly never get a break…a morsel, a
• crumb.