An Olympian lost his wedding ring during the Opening Ceremony of the Paris Olympics, but instead of letting it get to him, he chose to interpret it in a "poetic" way. His message about the incident, written as a love letter and apology to his wife, has gone viral.
On July 27, Italian high jumper Gianmarco Tamberi, 32, wrote a message to his wife, Chiara Bontempi Tamberi, on Instagram to address the mistake. "I'm sorry, my love, I'm so sorry," he wrote in Italian. While traveling down the Seine river as a flag bearer for Italy during the 2024 Olympics Opening Ceremony in Paris, his ring fell into the river.
When it comes to how he managed to lose the ring, he chalked it up to "too much water," losing too much weight, or too much "enthusiasm" — or, most likely, a combination of all three. He explained that he saw the ring fly away then land in the boat. He had some hope that he'd still be able to retrieve his wedding ring, but then saw it fly into the air and "dive into the water as if that was the only place where it wanted to be."
Though losing one's wedding ring is undoubtedly unfortunate, he noted that, "if it had to happen, if I had to lose this ring, I couldn't imagine a better place."
"It will remain forever in the riverbed of the city of love, flown away while I was trying to raise the Italian tricolor as high as possible during the opening ceremony of the most important sporting event in the world," Gianmarco continued.
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The mishap is something he wouldn't have been able to make up. "If I had to invent an excuse I would never have been so imaginative," he wrote.
Gianmarco also saw some romance in the situation, and told Chiara that she could throw her ring into the Seine as well, so their rings could be together.
"If you want, we will also throw yours into that river so that they will be together forever and we will have one more excuse to, as you always asked me, renew our vows and get married again," the Olympian wrote to his wife.
To him, there was something "poetic" about losing his wedding ring this way. His wife, Chiara, responded and said, "only you could turn this into something romantic," per BBC.
The outlet reported that the couple tied the knot in September 2022.
