Hands

image by bongoshock

I've seen some hands in my day. I expect to see a few more before it's over too. Those dexterous, silent and articulate pieces of body. I think there's a reason we make talking mouths of our hands. Hands will tell. Mouths may stay closed, but hands will talk.

Yesterday at work I sold a woman a Mochaccino. She had a quiet nice voice, and a housewife's body. But her mind was quick, and though she was a soft talker, her voice never trailed off into unheard decibels. She was having a treat while visiting a patient "Small... no, make it a large. This'll be today's treat."
But her hands, oh her fingers. They touched the fleshy thumb part of my palm as she put her dollars and coins in my hand. As coarse as coral. Like moving rock. Pleasant though, like her.

These last few weeks on our forays around the state for family holidays I watched my mother cook. Dad is the house chef, so Mom's dishes are specialties. Pop-overs, apple crisp. Mom and Dad respect each others respective expertise's. I've never had Dad-made pop-overs, or my mothers marinara sauce. They don't exist. They don't need to.
Mom made apple crisp for christmas dinner. She combined the 'crisp' topping in a bowl, measuring ingredients first in old yellow measuring spoons. Then she dropped the powders into her bare cupped hand to be dusted into the bowl, as though she were brushing soil off her hands after working the garden. I believe this made the crisp mixture lighter.
Her hands had a sheen to them as a cloud of baking powder erupted and sank into the bowl. She has young, smooth hands. She's not afraid to get them dirty, though she measures first. She makes an unparalleled apple crisp.