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‘The Lost Wedding Ring. It was Monday 5 July 1982 and my wife and I were on holiday, with our one-year old son, at a small cottage in the hills above Abersoch, in Gwynedd, Wales. I can be specific about the date because it was the day that Brazil played Italy in the 1982 World Cup. My mother and father had stayed with us over the weekend and were due to leave on the afternoon. In the morning, my wife had been washing the towels, nappies, and suchlike, and went outside to put them on the washing line. The washing line was up some steps at the back of the cottage, supported by two poles. The area was uphill and overgrown with grass, and beyond the stone-wall the hill went on up high to the summit. My wife suddenly cried out, and my father, mother and I rushed outside to see if we could help. What had happened was that, because my wife’s hands and fingers were cold and wet from the washing, when she had shaken one of the towels both her wedding and engagement rings had shot off the third finger of her left hand, and landed in the deep grass. All four of us searched for the rings and after a couple of minutes we found the engagement ring. But we could not find the wedding ring! We took everything into account – the direction of her hands when she shook the towel, where the engagement ring was found, etc etc – but no matter how hard we looked we could not find it. It was assumed that, when we were all making the initial search, one of us must have trodden on it and pushed it into the ground. So as a last resort my father and I set off into Abersoch where we eventually found a kind person to lend us a metal detector. Unfortunately we were to find that the ground had a lot of metal under it, with many pipes and objects found after digging down from a positive reading. We searched for many hours, but to no avail, and my parents had to leave to go home. Needless to say it was all very distressing. It was late in the afternoon, and we had virtually given up hope of ever finding the wedding ring, even though we knew that it must be within the limited area by the washing line. I was now alone, as my wife had gone in to see to our son. It was at this point that I remembered the old saying that if you have lost something then you should ask the fairies to help you retrieve it. So I decided to give it a try! I cannot remember exactly what I said, but it was along the lines of ‘If there are fairies out there and you can help me then please guide me to where the ring can be found’. Not knowing quite what to do next, I decided to clear my mind and see where my attention might go. I looked up and saw a large black bird hovering high up in the clear sky. I focused on it and then let my eye move in a direct line down below the bird to where the line met the ground before me. I concentrated on this piece of ground, and moved to it. I then moved the metal detector over the spot and got a ‘zap’ noise, to indicate that there was metal below. But when I moved the detector over the spot again – from the other direction – there was no repeat sound. Nevertheless, I decided that if this was where I had been guided then I should dig there. Therefore, I put my knife into the ground – and there was the wedding ring, edgeways into the ground! My family and I must have gone over that spot many times, but somehow missed the ring. The fact that the ring was pressed into the ground edgeways will have made it a much smaller target for the metal detector. But I know, beyond doubt, that this was the one spot that my attention had been drawn to, after I had asked the fairies to help me. Did I really get help from fairies? Who can tell? But my wife and I were relieved and delighted to have found her wedding ring. So I said a quiet, little ‘Thank you’ for its return.’ ‘I am a Fortean and so I keep an open mind [about the existence of fairies].’