I'm Diana, and for twenty years, I was a travel writer.

I wrote for Condé Nast Traveler, National Geographic, and a few others that have since folded or forgotten me. Forty-seven countries, mostly alone, mostly the places no one tells you to go.

Wherever I went, I bought jewelry. Not the airport stuff — the little stall in Fes where the silversmith's hands shook. The widow in Hatajima who wanted someone to wear her husband's pearls again. The six-hour haggle in Jaipur for a ring I almost talked myself out of.

Eighty-nine pieces. One cottage closet. And me, fifty-six, with knees that are done with cobblestones.

I'm letting most of them go.

I can't keep them all, and I don't want them sitting in a drawer when there are women — maybe you — who would actually wear them. Each piece has a story I'll try to tell. The prices feel almost disrespectful to the women who made them, but the alternative is worse: them gathering dust here while I sit on my porch wondering what I was holding onto.

If you find one that feels right, take it home. Wear it. If you find two — take them both.

— Diana
Vermont, written on a Tuesday