My nephew and godson Raymond sent me this photo of what he calls his favorite ring. It is a brass cast from an antique, silver ring from Afghanistan, my signature ring. On both sides of the ring are the figures of bats.

When I turned 60 I had 60 of these cast in brass with different stones--20 in amethyst, 20 in ruby, and 20 in blue sapphire. I gave them out to relatives and friends whom I valued. The amethyst rings went to martial arts practitioners, the ruby rings to visual artists, and the sapphire rings to theater arts practitioners.

The original ring. The stone is a black star sapphire: