The best souviner

So, you know how you sometimes look in a mirror and see a few new lines, a new wrinkle here, an extra crowsfoot there, a crease that wasn't a part of your face the last time you looked?  That's always a bit discouraging even though you firmly believe that a few new wrinkles are a part of who you are, and every wrinkle has a story. I do believe that, and you know what they say; something like "the alternative to getting wrinkles is being dead."  That's true, unless you start with the plastic surgery and that's just scary. Not for me! No one is ever going to put a scalpel to my face, or inject poison into my forehead. Or put ass fat into my lips...eeek!

I've lost my train of thought now. Wait.....ummmmm, oh yeah, when I look in the mirror and see my face getting older, I sometimes miss the "dewy glow of youth", but I also look into my own eyes (that's not as creepy as it sounds) and I see my mothers eyes. It sometimes rather shocks me, our eyes are the exact same colour, which, when you look closely is a green/hazel/gold sort of colour.  They used to be really vivid, and yeah, I'll say it, pretty striking too. I used to get lots of compliments on my eyes.Now that I'm older they look tired and, well, older. That's how I remember my mothers eyes. It kind of makes me sad.

However, I spend very little time looking in the mirror these days, so I don't see my eyes that often. Honestly, sometimes I don't look in the mirror for an entire day after my teeth are brushed. To expand on that statement, I brush my teeth as soon as I get up, and I always look in the mirror and think of my dad, who used to love Crest toothpaste (which is all I use) because he said it made him "foam like a mad dog." My mum was always telling him: "Oh for Gods sakes Brian, would you go wash your mouth off" as he growled down the hallway, foaming like....you got it, a mad dog.

But, I digress.  I don't look in the mirror often, but I do see my hands a thousand times a day. My hands look old. I don't wear mitts or gloves much, and thus my hands have a kind of  weathered look, I think they look older than they are. They are not nice looking hands, I don't have a fancy manicure and they are pretty "crinkly" as my little neighbour once told me. But I love my hands. I just love them!  They are my mothers hands and my grandmothers hands. I look at them and imagine the people they have touched, the tears they have dried, the foreheads they have smoothed and the shoulders they have hugged. The beloved dogs they have patted and scratched, as well as the ants and grasshoppers and worms they have gingerly cleaned from little boys pockets, not to mention all the disgusting things, you know, things like diapers and flu ridden kids, housetraining puppies and the like.
I am very tactile, I love to touch things and I've been reprimanded in museums more than once, so  there is also all of the ancient statues and paintings that these hands have reached out to put a finger on, quickly before the guards could see. The sands, and beaches and oceans they have dipped into. The unusual and foreign foods they have carried to my mouth...mmmmmm. The clear plexiglass window they placed a palm on, not able to feel the palm on the other side. The phone they clutched, as if the voice coming through could be absorbed into their sensitive finger tips and stored away inside.

Talk about a souvenir....who needs fridge magnets and T-shirts? These hands have touched the places where emperors slept, and touched the places where my babies slept.  Touched the rough, red soil in a small African village and patted the deep brown earth around the petunias in my front yard.

Touched my mothers face the last time I said goodby to her, and held my fathers hand the last time I said goodby to him.  So why on earth would I look at my hands and be sad at the shape they are in? These hands are who I am, I look at them daily and marvel at the places they have been, and the stories they could tell. They say that the your fingertips are the most sensitive part of your body, I wonder if they retain memories too? Wouldn't that be something? If they could talk? Hmmm..maybe just as well that they can't. I think my hands are the ultimate secret keeper.