Real stories · The little medal I hold

In waiting rooms I reach for it without thinking — the little medal at my collar

A small medal you find yourself holding in waiting rooms — that's what this necklace has become for me, and I mean that in the gentlest way. I'm 67, and lately the calendar has more of those little nervous half-hours in it than it used to: Malcolm's check-ups, my own, the phone calls you wait for. A person wants something quiet to hold on to.

I didn't know I was looking for it until it arrived.

It's the Madonelle from a British label called York Boutique — a gold-tone medallion of the Madonna, ringed with a little halo of crystals, on a fine chain. Nothing showy; just a quiet, lovely thing.

The size is the wisdom of it. It's light enough to forget — which is why it simply stays on, every day, rather than living in a drawer for best — and just present enough that my hand finds it by itself in the nervous moments, the way you'd touch a familiar stone in your pocket. Over a jumper it reads as elegance; to me it reads as steadiness.

A small gold-tone Madonna with a halo of crystals, light enough to wear every day — which is why it's simply there, at the collar, when the waiting rooms come round.

It was £19.95, half the usual £40 — less than the flowers I'd take to the friend I've since bought one for. A fortnight to send it back and free delivery, noted and never needed.

It has since been worn every day for a month — church, the shops, one long Tuesday at the hospital where it earned its keep — and when Margaret admired it at the coffee morning and heard the story, she went quiet for a moment and then asked me to write the name down. Her sister starts treatment in November. That one's ordered too.

If your calendar also has its nervous half-hours, or someone you love is facing theirs, do have a look. The Madonelle is rated 4.7 out of 5 by more than 200 customers — and at half price, with the gift season coming, it's the kind of small present that means more than it costs.