A few decades ago, when the late broadcaster Paul Harvey used to provide “The Rest of the Story,” he told about a well-to-do couple who’d given each other expensive wedding rings, engraved, with names and dates, before taking a trans-Atlantic cruise on a luxury liner.
Not accustomed to wearing a ring at all, the new husband must have let it slip off his finger, falling into the deep blue sea. As Paul Harvey explained, the couple, then years older, took the same voyage, and on their return trip sat down to a seafood dinner. Suddenly, Harvey related, the husband bit into something hard, almost chipping a tooth.
The man discovered he’d bitten into a . . . into a . . . fishbone!
Surprised? What are the chances that a tiny object in millions of cubic miles of ocean would end up in the owner’s bicuspid?
Holding back giggles, Harvey apologized for getting radio listeners’ hopes up. And as for me, I merely repeated the story; I didn’t make it up. However, there is a similar truthful account of a ring that went missing for years and years, and with the tenacious work of a handful of people, went back to its owner.
The missing-then-found object was a VHS/RHS class ring, owned by Alfonzo Vigil. I’ve known Alfonzo for many years, his house having been on my Optic route in the early ‘50s. I knew most of his family: Martha, Antonia, Mary, Mabel, Dora, Al, Jose, etc.
Here’s what Alfonzo says happened:
Alfonzo graduated in 1959 and bought a class ring bearing his initials, “A.V.” He took a job with the local Foremost Dairy, and while at work one day, he removed the ring. “It must have rolled down into the heater vent,” he said. “I told Mom I’d lost the ring, and she told me I shouldn’t have taken it off in the first place.”
Meanwhile, the military called, taking Alfonzo away for almost three years. “I left the car at home; my sister, Martha, and brother, Jose, drove it. When I got back, the car was gone, maybe worn out,” he said.
Much more recently, an RHS teacher, Gale Cunico, spoke to counselor Amadee Duran, explaining her husband, Scott, had found a ring inside a car he had been working on. According to Alfonzo, Gale carried the ring on a chain around her neck, hoping to locate the owner of the ring that was already about 55 years old.
Scott Cunico, who works on vehicles, had discovered the ring in the deep recesses of the dashboard vent. And by checking yearbook photos from that era, Gale and Amadee were able to determine that the ring belonged to Alfonzo.
So, after several decades, Alfonzo and his class ring were reunited — only this year. Alfonso, who weighs about 135 pounds — his actual high school weight — noted that the ring “slipped back on easily.”
And he’s thankful for the help mixed with curiosity of people like the Cunicos and Amadee, whose efforts made this story much more palpable than the fish tale Paul Harvey told so many years ago.
• • •
Angelina Vigil has at least one fan, someone from perhaps 100 miles away, who believes the matter she was involved in spurs two expressions: A tempest in a teapot and A mountain out of a molehill.
The duly selected fiesta queen recently posted something on Facebook, the social media forum on most people’s computers, that drew the ire of half the members of the Española Fiesta Executive Council.
She wrote a message complaining about the village of Española, sprinkling the post with words that were x-ed out by the time the story hit the media.
Essentially, Angelina’s angry spiel about the town caused the 22-member Española Fiesta Executive Council to split 11 to 11 on her fate: dethrone her, or allow her to keep her crown and represent the community.
The media reported that despite Angelina’s tear-filled apology, the board nevertheless voted to dismiss her. The council’s justification: “It was determined by the Española Fiesta Executive Council that her actions could not be rectified and cannot redeem the damage created by her mistake on social media.”
Lest we forget, her Facebook post came after the theft of her crown and scepter. Police have since arrested a 19-year-old woman and a 21-year-old man, in connection with the heist of the crown.
The young woman clearly was upset over the theft of the items and complained about it — in a forum to whom many people had access.
I believe the council’s decision was an over-reaction. People’s comments often are influenced by external factors — such as the breaking into her mother’s house and the subsequent act of absconding with the crown and scepter.
She’s young, she was angry, she apologized. She was punished for putting into writing something others may even agree with but don’t want to read.
The council’s decision seems punitive.
• • •
Do the surnames Lancaster and Schaffer sound familiar? To many alumni of Robertson High School, they should.
In an email exchange I had with RHS alumnus Steve Franken, he invoked the names of Helen Lancaster and Ruth Schafer who, he wrote, “would have a conniption if they knew you ended a sentence with a preposition!”
Indeed I did, not for spite or rebellion, but simply because I disagree with that pre-Civil War rule. I can’t remember the grammatical atrocity in my email to former Las Vegas Mayor Franken. But I plead guilty nevertheless.
In my reply to Franken, I explained that I usually end my sentences with a prOposition.” That’s where I’m coming from.
The Lancaster-Schafer duo, owners of a stellar reputation for English grammatical correctness, were never my teachers, as I attended Immaculate Conception School.
However, when a group of us Highlands English majors observed RHS classes, in preparation for practice teaching, we trembled when Ms. Schafer said to her students, “Don’t be intimidated by the visiting college students. Does it occur to you that they might not know the answers?”