Her Hands
I often look at my mum's face in the old photos. She is young like a blooming rose in the hands of warm soil, a bird that just left its nest ready to embrace life. I ask questions. Where are all these days gone? The days when my mum was in her thirties walking down in her flowery dress with me, a little girl then. I loved to walk hand in hand with her. I loved the games we played in the park. I loved her food packed with all the richness of flavour, sweetness and bitterness. I loved summers most. She used to cook till late midnight closing the whole summer in the big-bellied jars. Bitterish gooseberries, sourish blackcurrants, honey sweet strawberries and apricots landed at the bottom of them making space for mouth-watering thick syrup that formed from sugar and juice released by fruit.
Her hands worked so hard: washing, peeling, cutting, chopping, grinding, grating, mixing, stirring, rolling, kneading, drying and serving us. Her hands conjured up miracles. All sorts of dumplings stuffed with strawberries, blueberries and cherries were piled up on the plates. Soup was boiling happily in the pot. Her vegetarian, roasted stuffed peppers spread a nice smell in the flat. Fish in a Greek sauce was served with buckwheat which my sister and I believed was made of a turtle. One day I noticed some distortion in her hands.
'Why do your hands look so strange, mama?' I asked staring at her eyes, nearly getting drowned in the blue ocean of them. She raised her eyebrows and shut her eyes suppressing tears swelling to a gigantic size inside her.
'It is nothing, baby. Go and play. Dinner will be served soon.'
Then she used to put her hands in the pockets and stare into the distance for a while. I still watched her from the corner of room. Her face went pale, tears trickling down her thin face. I yearned to go and hug her, but I didn't want her to know I was secretly watching her. I run outside to play with dolls she bought for me. However, I could not forget her sad face. In each doll I played, I found her sweet, worried face. Tears run down my cheeks.
I came back home and run straight to her to say how much I loved her. I saw her figure bent over the food cutting meticulously vegetables into even pieces. Then I could see the bulging part of her hand as if a bone was ready to jump out of it and rip her skin releasing the river of blood. I saw all the blue veins running through her hands and the distinct lines etched in her palms as she dexterously washed more vegetables under the stream of cold water. I wanted to take her hand in my hands and take care of it, but how?
One day I saw her burn her finger badly. I run to the wardrobe and searched for my old summer dress she once gave me for my birthday. I took out the dress and beautiful sunflowers smiled at me. I cut a piece of it, large enough to sew a kitchen glove. I used an extra layer from a coat fabric to make sure the glove was thick enough to protect my mum’s hands while cooking.
On Mother' s Day I put it on the kitchen table with a little note for her. Her face beamed. She tried it on and proudly looked at it in the mirror as if it was a garment she was to wear in the street. Then she took it off. Her eyes fixated on me. She put her hand on my shoulder patting it gently.
'Thank you, Darling. You do not know how much it means for me. These hands...', then she hesitated. Her eyes filled up with tears. They soon flooded her face.
She cried, cried and cried.
'It is ok, mum.' I hugged her. I heard nothing but her cry.
'It is ok, mum.' I patted her hair.
Her mighty cry filled up my lungs, echoing in my head, ears, and then each part of my body.
By AD, June 2020
Photo by Ant Rozetsky on Unsplash