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Here's the thing of it ... and I don't mean to be waxing philosophical on you all ... but ... if it's made of gold and has a diamond in it and it hangs on a chain around your neck ... and it?s decorative by your standards ... is it jewelry? Well ... what if it's not gold ... or any other precious metal ... and it does not have a diamond in it ... or any other gem for that matter ... but it still hangs around your neck and it's still decorative by your standards ... is it still jewelry? If not ... why not?
What if it's just a little doo-dad you found on a forest floor one day ... a bird's claw for instance or a bear's tooth ... and you took a liking to it ... and you tied a piece of string to it and hung it around your neck ... would it be jewelry? I say it would. But now here's a divergence. Let's go back to that diamond. If you took it off your neck and hung it in a rather fashionable way around a sash tied around your waist ... would it still be jewelry? And if instead of that diamond ... you took that bird's claw or that bear tooth off of your neck and tied to the sash around your waist ... would that still be jewelry.
We come to a juncture here my friends. There will be those who will think--as do I--that all this is still jewelry even when it ties around that sash around your waist because it's decorative and fashionable and tends to enhance the image you are trying to present to your friends. And there are purists out there who will insist that a bird's claw tied to a sash ain't jewelry no how and no way.
Let us ... for the sake of this discussion ... take the side of those that agree that it does not have to be gold to be jewelry ... and it does not have to be worn around one's neck. A bird's claw will be fine ... tied to a sash around your waist will also be fine. Jewelry ... by any other name ... is still jewelry. Following this irrefutable form of logic ... I am going to present to you a magnificent piece of jewelry that was not only decorative and fashionable in its time ... but also served a purpose. Can jewelry attain a higher level than this I ask you?
They were a fierce tribe of the Amazonian rain forest ... and they possessed as it were ... two souls. This is quite a gift for most of us have only one soul which we hold quite dear ... for if we lose it ... we can not--to the best of our knowledge-- replace it. The name of the first soul was Arutam ... and it gave its possessor the power to kill. But not with impunity ... for the second soul--Muisak--existed for the sole purpose of avenging the death of the one you killed. These are the check and balances of life my friends. For every Yin there's a Yang ... for every plus there's a minus ... for every head there's ... well ... you get the idea.
But the tribesmen liked killing ... and they had to figure a way to evade revenge upon their souls by Muisak. And they did. They made a piece of jewelry of sorts ... I will not yet tell you what ... but I do believe they wore this fashionable doo-dad hanging off of a sash tied around their waists. I'm not too sure about this part ... but when you see it I am sure you will agree it's quite plausible. So go take a look at the image I am about to show you ... and tell me if you think it's jewelry.
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And there ya have it. That's it for this week folks. Catch you all next week. Benjamin Mark
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