Mothers Hands

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Mothers Hands

Night after night, she came to tuck me in, even long after my childhood
years. Following her long-standing custom, she'd lean down and push
my long hair out of the way, then kiss my forehead.

I don't remember when it first started annoying me--her hands pushing my
hair that way. But it did annoy me, for they felt work-worn and rough
against my young skin. Finally, one night, I lashed out at her:
"Don't do that anymore--your hands are too rough!" She didn't say anything
in reply. But never again did my mother close out my day with that familiar
expression of her love. Lying awake long afterward, my words haunted me.
But pride stifled my conscience, and I didn't tell her I was sorry.

Time after time, with the passing year's, my thoughts returned to that night.
By then I missed my mother's hands, missed her goodnight kiss upon my
forehead. Sometimes the incident seemed very close, sometimes far away.
But always it lurked, hauntingly, in the back of my mind.

Well, the years have passed, and I'm not a little girl anymore. Mom is in
her mid-seventies, and those hands I once thought to be so rough are
still doing things for me and my family. She's been our doctor,
reaching into a medicine cabinet for the remedy to calm a young girls
stomach or soothe a boy's scraped knee. She cooks the best fried chicken
in the world...gets stains out of blue jeans like I never could...
and still insists on dishing out ice cream at any hour of the day or night.

Through the years, my mother's hands have put in countless hours of toil,
and most of hers were before perma-pressed fabrics and automatic washers!

Now, my own children are grown and gone. Mom no longer has Dad,
and on special occasions, I find myself drawn next door to spend the
night with her. So it was that late one Thanksgiving Eve, as I drifted
into sleep in the bedroom of my youth, a familiar hand hesitantly stole
across my face to brash the hair from my forehead. Then a kiss,
ever so gently, touched my brow.

In my memory, for the thousandth time, I recalled the night my surly young
voice complained: "Don't do that anymore--your hands are too rough!" I
reacted involuntarily. Catching Mom's hand in mine, I blurted out how
sorry I was for that night. I thought she'd remember, as I did.
But Mom didn't know what I was talking about. She had forgotten--and
forgiven--long ago.

That night, I fell asleep with a new appreciation for my gentle mother
and her caring hands. And the guilt I had carried around for so long
was nowhere to be found.

By......Louisa Goddisart McAQuillen

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy,
it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude,
it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered,
it keeps no record of wrongs.

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