46/2025: These Hands of Mine

Image © Jose 2025

Another weekend of work at the house, some hard and dirty work, understanding it depends on what I compare it to, and in my case to my 40-to-60-hour workweek where I am dressed professionally and spend 80% of the time on the computer and 80% of the time in meetings (in parallel). Sifting and sorting through the hundreds of items packed in drawers and wooden crates, removing all shelving and nails from the walls, up on a ladder removing the old, shredded fiberglass insulation, mask and safety goggles on (the goggles fog up immediately).

At a certain point I paused, took a moment to celebrate the fact that I was feeling alive and energized by doing the work, and that my body seemed to be collaborating but not thrilled, and making sure I remember at night when I go to bed or the following morning. I took a shower and my hands were sore, stinging under the hot water from the many bruises and cuts. I took some time cleaning them and making sure they looked decent for the start of the week at the office, and then I started paying attention to them, really paying attention.

For many, our hands are the front line of our existence. I am not assuming that is the case for everyone; a friend who ran a marathon showed me his feet at the end, those were his front-line extensions. I remember the images of ballerinas once they take off their pointe shoes, for some, their feet may be their front line. And some may not have hands, or feet, and I am sure they still have parts of their body that serve as their front line.

For me it is my hands, and I was looking at them and trying to remember what they have been through outside the normal, because we don’t even realize what they go through every day as a normal day, where nothing special happens. How many times we touch things. How many movements and micro-movements. How many strong grips or soft caresses they perform.

My hands are clunky. My palms are larger than usual; I guess I take after my father, who only needed to hit his hand on the table for me to do whatever he demanded, fast. Funny enough, the last person to slap me was my mother, with her fine hands and beautiful fingers. She did so when I was 18 and said, “This is for you to remember you still have a mother.” She was right, I had done something stupid and needed reminding.

My fingers are short and a bit stubby, not too short, with wide knuckles and thick, ridged nails. My left hand has those six stitches on the index and middle finger from that night 45 years ago cutting foamcore before a presentation. The tip of the index has a more recent cut that had three stitches and will forever be numb because some tendons were not fixed properly, a reminder of how to hold a moray when preparing to dry it out in the sun.

My right hand is considerably larger than the left because I’m dexterous, and I have a couple of stitches in the thumb and a scar in the palmar area, though I don’t remember how those came about. I have calloused areas, but the most prominent ones are on the middle finger from pens and pencils, no special callouses from playing an instrument, lifting weights, or punching for a living.

My skin is always very dry; I wash my hands many times and always use hot water, so hot other people wonder how I don’t burn myself. When it gets cold, some of my fingers turn white, especially the ring and middle fingers, I have Raynaud’s disease. Right now, I clean them harder with a brush, and keep my nails short. Still, they look a bit scruffy.

I’ve always loved looking at people’s hands, and there is beauty in all of them. I like to imagine what they do, what they go through, how they cope. These marvelous tools that many of us are lucky to have are so often forgotten, taken for granted, except when they get hurt. Tonight, as I look at them, I feel grateful for everything they’ve carried, and everything they still allow me to do.