The other day, my Mom and I were sitting on the couch and she was showing me her hands.
“I got a manicure,” she said as she held out her hands and showed me her shortly filed nails that had been painted with a clear polish.
“They look nice,” I said. “But then, I’ve always loved your hands.”
“You have?” she asked, with surprise.
“Yep…I always wished I had inherited your hands.”
“Huh! I never knew that,” she responded.
And it’s true.
As long as I can remember, I have wished I had inherited my mother’s hands.
She has long tapered fingers and beautifully, perfectly shaped nails.
I used to sit on the piano bench with her and watch her fingers glide, effortlessly over the keys as she played hymn after hymn and try to emulate her finger movements when I sat down, myself, to practice.
I loved watching her write…her pen shaping pretty letters with her practiced penmanship, which I was always sure looked so nice because her hands were so pretty.
Even watching her make meatloaf, covering those hands in ground beef and seasoning made me wish I had those hands.
I don’t have her hands.
Not at all.
My hands are small.
My fingers are short and not tapered.
My nails aren’t perfectly shaped.
There’s nothing wrong with my hands…they do the work they need to do and are caring and gentle and comforting hands…but aren’t beautiful hands, as my Mom’s once were.
However, the conversation got me thinking.
What is it that my children will remember about me?
What piece of me, that I take completely for granted, will be the thing my children always remember?
What is it, that when we sit on their couches when they are grown, will cause them to say, “I always wish I had that of yours, Mom. I always remember that about you.”
Who knows…maybe it will be my hands, after all, because often, what we find to be most imperfect about ourselves is the one thing that someone else could not live without.
“To the world, you are one person, but perhaps, to one person, you are the whole world.”
