the ring on my finger doesn’t fit — Asian American Feminist Collective

The ring doesn’t fit on my finger the way it used to. And I thought that was funny when I noticed it. With the windows down and my fingers dancing in the breeze, it felt a bit loose, as if a single misstep could have her flying off my finger and onto the road at a hundred miles an hour.

I continued to let her dance in the wind. She felt free. No longer constrained by the way I imagined things were supposed to be or suggested to be, but her true authentic self. If she decides to fall off, if she decides to stay, who could blame her? It’s not my hand’s fault for changing shape. That’s the natural way of things. Sometimes we click, sometimes we don’t.

I entertained the thought of it going either way. Emotions no longer controlled how I viewed her.

It’s just a ring, I thought.

About Andrew Mai

Andrew Mai is a social entrepreneur based in Jersey City, NJ. Andrew is the founder of the Vietnamese Development Project and the co-founder of region, a community journal that documents and explores the lives of immigrants, refugees, and first-generation Americans living in the Midwest.