LINCOLN SQUARE — Heidi Bush knows that a mugging last spring, when she was robbed at gunpoint walking home from the gym, could have cost her more than her cellphone and heirloom wedding rings.
"It could have been a lot worse," said Bush, executive director of the Lincoln Square Friendship Center food pantry.
But even that knowledge hasn't lessened the sting for Bush of being robbed of jewelry that had far more emotional than monetary value.
Patty Wetli says Bush hopes social media can help locate the rings:
For the past seven months, she said she's tried to tell herself, "They're just things" whenever she's thought about her stolen rings. But the more time has passed, the less okay she's become with their loss.
"I'm really connected with my family," she said. "These rings were special."
Bush's sparklers were pieced together by a friend from her great-grandmother's wedding band — a circlet of hand-etched silver that dated back to the 1920s — and gemstones her husband inherited from his mom, who died before Bush had the chance to meet her.
"We pulled things from both families," she said. "I envisioned someday passing it down to someone."
The rings were taken from Bush on March 3 as she walked home from a martial arts class in Lincoln Square. She was heading east on Ainslie toward Damen Avenue at about 10:30 p.m. — "I've taken this route hundreds of times" — when she noticed a couple of suspicious-looking guys trailing her.
"I was on my phone — shame on me," she said. "I always call my husband when I'm walking home late at night."
She crossed the street to see if she could shake the men but they followed suit.
"One of the guys started running after me. He had a gun on him and said, 'Give me your phone and wallet,'" Bush recalled.
She handed over the items, and the thief, gun still pointed at Bush, asked her to help him deactivate her phone.
"I was so flustered, I said, "I have no idea,'" she said.
The gunman finally told Bush to walk away in the opposite direction, jumped into a waiting car and rode off with his accomplice.
A shaken Bush didn't immediately realize her rings were gone. It was only later, when talking to the police, that she remembered she had placed her jewelry in a pouch in her wallet for safe keeping during her workout.
Officers told her they'd watch to see if the rings turned up at a pawn shop, and Bush unsuccessfully searched the alleys and dumpsters near the scene of the robbery in case the thief ditched the wallet after removing her credit card.
"I guess for a long time I was really hopeful that something would show up," she said.
With the seasons having changed from spring to summer to fall, Bush decided to make a last-ditch effort to recover her rings. Knowing she couldn't possibly visit every one of the city's hundreds of pawn shops, she took to social media to ask for help from her fellow Chicagoans, posting a Hail Mary plea to Facebook on Oct. 4.
"I know this is a long shot but it has been weighing on my mind and heart.... I suspect this won't get very far but maybe, just maybe, someone knows someone who has seen these rings.... While I could have lost a great deal more the night they were taken it still hurts to know this family history is out there somewhere," she wrote.
"There is nothing that can truly replace the rings worn by women of strength in my family who are now long gone. Call me sentimental but I liked wearing something that reminded me of the women who came before me," the post concluded.
Though Bush acknowledges that chances of recovering her rings are slim, stranger things have happened.
A pet parrot found its way home after disappearing four years ago. In September, a wedding photo found in the debris at Ground Zero was returned to its owner 13 years later. And, file this under "you can't make this stuff up," a Swedish woman discovered her wedding ring — missing for 16 years — wrapped around a carrot growing in her garden.
"I thought I might as well try," said Bush, noting that her Facebook post has already been shared more than 350 times.
Bush has set up an email account — mygreatgrandmothersring@gmail.com — to receive messages relating to the rings' whereabouts. She's offering a reward for their return, no questions asked.
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