It all began sometime around the early 2010’s when I was living in East Vancouver. I liked to visit the SPCA Thrift Store on Victoria Drive quite often, and on one occasion, this particular ring caught my eye from within the glass showcase. It stood out to me due to its size but also due to its volume, it looked hefty and I was curious about whether it was as solid and substantial as it appeared. Indeed it was, and it just so happened to be priced like any other thrift store costume jewellery ring, so I bought it. The fact that it was signed on the back Rafael Canada also seemed to suggest this wasn’t your average ring, it was a significant piece of jewellery. For years, I meant to look into this company or person but forgot about it until I got to Guelph.

I started wearing it regularly once life after the pandemic started returning to normal. I don’t have a good reason for why, I just felt like I needed it. If you and I have met in person, or even online through a video call, you will have probably seen me wearing it. You may have even been there that one time I briefly left a get-together at Brass Taps to sprint across campus after accidentally leaving it in a washroom. I had removed it to wash my hands and placed in on the counter where it had been occluded by the sink (thankfully perhaps) so I left without putting it back on. To be fair, this was after I had started down this rabbit hole so it had gained even more meaning by that point.

Anyway, one day around the end of the pandemic, I decided to finally figure out who Rafael is and where he lived within Canada. The search results were not what I expected, no official website, no wikipedia entry, nothing but places to buy jewellery and a couple of blog entries posting about his work. Hmmm…

Chapter 2 – Where did you go??

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