It’s in Our Hands

I have dirty hands.

Like… seriously, permanently, dirty hands.

I have always been drawn to dirt. I used to help my mother in her garden (hands + mud = fun!). When I was a little older, I began horseback riding (woah, mud). I then began teaching horseback riding lessons and training horses (it is just mud on my hands, right?) In college I concentrated in ceramics (basically just slightly cleaner mud). After graduating, I moved to a horse farm to work (mud up to my knees!) and now I live on a small farm, gardening and planting in, digging and shoveling up, tromping and sludging through MUD.

And you know what? My hands are always dirty, and I like to say they look a good 40 years older than they actually are. The dirt has worked its way into the little cracks and crevices (of which there are many) and it is impossible to remove; no amount of pumicing, brushing, scrubbing and soaking will ever rid me of the worn look of my hands. No amount of slathering, dipping, treating or moisturizing will ever restore them to youthful.

I used to blame this on my life style. I was made very aware of the state of my hands when I started baking for market. I began moisturizing to little improvement, and I began noticing the state of my hands more and more often. I soon found that the cleanest my hands ever looked was right after doing a huuuuuuuge batch of baking dishes (like… hours at the sink). Still, even when clean my hands are those of my grandmother. In fact, they are those of my  mother, too.

This past week I was clearing out some old junk at my parents’ old house (the very last of it, in fact) and I stumbled across my college photography portfolio. I’ve always been more of a technical photographer than an art photographer, as my professor told me over and over, but it was nice to go back through the silly assignments she had given us. One in particular was showcasing my mother’s hands. It really hit home how close she and I have become as I have grown. Her hands are (forgive me, mum) gnarled and functional. She has deep wrinkles and loose skin across the back of her hand. She has large knuckles from arthritis that speaks of strength and ability. I find myself incredibly inspired by her hands, despite the fact that she finds them less than fantastic.

As I age I realize my hands are becoming hers, just as hers are slowly becoming her mother’s. The wrinkles deepen, the skin pulls in funny ways, and yet it’s speaks so deeply to my love for the earth beneath me – and her’s as well.

My mother has been a gardener since before I was born. We like to say we are “planters” or “growers” because we love to propagate and start plants, but we are both still learning to enjoy the act of Gardening. Together we have sold perennials, hawked native plants and half followed through on whatever-harebrained-scheme one of us would come up with next, from digging up doomed wildflowers (rescue missions) to liberating excess native plantlings (be freeee!). We’ve done so many things with our hands, together.

My mother is also a fantastic pianist and has taught piano lessons for years. There was even a period in high school that I would justify my old hands by saying I played the piano… This, of course, was silly. Lots of pianists have nice, soft hands. It may, however, have contributed to knobby knuckles and arthritis… but who cares, when you have music at your finger tips?

So yes, I have dirty hands. I have cracked, calloused, wrinkled, knobby, gnarly hands, but my hands speak about who I am on so many levels. They proudly proclaim that I am practical, I am strong and I am deeply tied to my family.