Fortunes

Who are those that are truly rich? Recently I was watching reruns of Mad About You and it was the episode titled “Money Changes Everything.” Ira’s ex returns. The back story is that after leaving Ira she married a count somewhere and became a contessa. And then the count died. She returns and has her contessa tiara with her. It’s bejeweled and pretty and sparkly. Jamie tries it on and goes about the rest of what she has to do that morning with it on.

Tiaras do seem to have magical powers. Wearing one makes any day better. I have a flowered crown with streamers that I call my “pretty pretty princess hat” and I love to wear it randomly. We bought it at the wild flower farms in Texas back in 2004.

My dad thinks it’s silly. I think he’s just jealous. It’s a great princess hat.

Several years ago as we were all in meetings at the beginning of the school year, a few teachers and I decided that meetings would be a lot better if they let us wear tiaras to them. That turned into having a school wide theme for Halloween that year. Everyone was welcome to declare themselves the winner of whatever beauty pageant they wanted and wear a tiara. We had a cave woman, a witch, a queen, a princess, all kinds of tiara wearers. It was great. The tiaras made a great difference.

At the end of the Mad About You episode Jamie has had to give back the bejeweled tiara. She and Paul are sitting on the couch watching TV. She has on a paper crown now and Paul apologizes that it isn’t bejeweled. Jamie replies that the contessa’s hadn’t said “Happy New Year” on it. And that is where the fortune lies.

The bejeweled tiara wasn’t necessary. Those who have family, friends, love, those are the ones with the true fortune. And if you have that, then any tiara can seem like a bejeweled crown.