When I was a little girl, I was fascinated with my mother's hands. The softness of her skin and the smooth, warm lines of veins hiding just below it's surface. I could touch her fingernails for hours, pulling her fingers up with my tiny fingertips tucked just inside the curve of her nail, letting them fall back against her lap as I sat beside her listening to any number of stories she might be reading aloud to us on a long, cold evening. Her long, slender fingers -- her nails strong and shining -- were beautiful in the summer. Equally beautiful were her winter hands with drying skin she struggled to keep soft through countless sinks of dishwater, endless loads of laundry and our nightly baths. With splitting cuticles, assorted burns from loading our wood stove, and red, slowly deepening cracks, her hands were the hands of a mother. Sacrificial, tender, serving hands.
As my dear husband is well aware (because I love to make him so;), my hands have been very dry these last few weeks and the skin of my right thumb and middle finger has cracked in multiple places right at the tip of my finger, making even the most simple of tasks a painful endeavor. In these last few weeks of icy Vermont winter, nothing has been keeping my hands soft through the million and thirteen thousand times I wash my hands on a given day.
Because my hands have hurt -- stung, ached, cracked, and bled -- for days, I've been a little bit preoccupied with them. Every beautifully blue enamelware dish handwashed for my children; every cloth diaper changed, sprayed, wrung, laundered, folded, and changed again; every trip outside to play or walk; every buckling and unbuckling of Ladybug's seat (which has to be done with a bare hand -- the space-age seats are impossible to operate with gloves) has left me whimpering and wincing. So, I've been on a one-woman-hand-repair mission this past week. Moisturizing, filing, clipping away the edges of each split to avoid it getting deeper (yes, this does seem counter-intuitive, but I promise it works), and repeat.
Today, for the first time in three weeks, I can bend my fingers without pain. I can wash a diaper without stinging (though after every wash I am quite literally running for one of the various tubs of moisturizer stashed about the house). I can wash the dishes... but, let's face it, Ladybug doesn't really need a dish to eat out of yet and Big Brother is away for the weekend, so maybe I'll just stick those in the dishwasher. ;)
Today, I am thankful for hands that are finally soft. But as I've been appreciating this hard-won comfort, I've realized that I'm thankful for my dry hands, too. Thankful for hands that scream, "I change my baby's diapers and wash them for her. Together, my son and I make and clean up messes. I sometimes, on the very coldest of days, carry my mitten-ed baby in the windy island air bare-handed because I want to make sure I know just how cold her tiny fingers might be feeling. I live every day with my babies. I don't always have time for a manicure because there are forts to be built around the table, and stories to be read, music to be danced to, lullabies to be sung while hopping twice on each foot until drool soaks the shoulder of my shirt, and many dishes waiting to be cleared of the meals I have made for the ones I love."
For these hands are the hands of a mother. Sacrificial, tender, serving hands.
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