I have always been intrigued by my dad’s hands, and the beauty of them as they worked and toiled through the years.
Those hands have played a guitar since he was 16 ,( nonstop) planted crops, processed pigs, deer, cattle, and even ran a trap line along the creek to keep his family fed through some lean years.
Those hands have baled hay, built barns, built a home, changed motors, and transmissions in his vehicles, replaced hydraulic lines, hydraulic pumps, gears, pulleys, and built miles of fence in his lifetime.
Those hands have taken many state and national ribbons for his artistic talents in Taxidermy which made him a bit famous around these parts, and he still remembered to pet the family dogs.
He took the time to help us kids with our homework, late at night at the kitchen table, after his factory job during the day, and after he came in from working the fields till dark-thirty. He would eat his supper and help us between bites of food and drinks of strong coffee.
I can still see him leaning over my shoulder at the kitchen table explaining the beginnings of algebra to me. It was such a foreign concept in my mind to “marry” letters and numbers together….but as he stood over me, I could smell the strong black coffee on him, I could see the grease impregnated into his skin and beneath his nails, i would follow all the large veins that looked like a roadmap a crossed the tops of his hands, with my eyes and I was more in awe of THOSE HANDS, and THE MAN, than any school lesson he was trying to help me with.
I have always said that I was born a hundred years too late. The way my mind and heart work, I would go back to 1862 in a minute. I am antiquated in my ways, and quite possibly an incurable romantic. In kindergarten, I married off all my crayons. A small yellow box, Crayola 8, and they had to have someone too. Orange married red, Green was married to yellow, Blue was married to purple, and black was married to brown.
Today, at a funeral, I had a hard time keeping myself together, the world is down another GOOD MAN. My cousin David Bainbridge was taken from us. I will miss all our conversations about history. It’s hard to find people that like to talk about that stuff with such vigor and enthusiasm and knowledge as Cousin Dave had.
During the service, I would glance over at my dad, and my heart would overflow with how grateful I feel to see him sitting there. Still here, still healthy, still so wise, still treating all people with common decency, STILL SO HUMBLE………. and STILL……….I am mesmerized by HIS HANDS, and the stories they hold.
I have his hands, the same shape, and length, arthritis in the same places, enlarged thumb joints, knuckles larger than my fingers. I couldn’t cup my hands together and carry any water to anything. The joints won’t allow them to squeeze in for a temporary bowl or cup. I confess, it feels like a rite of passage. After the funeral we sat together during the luncheon, and I ask my aunt to snap a photo of us. It wasn’t a good picture of me, but ……IT WAS A GREAT SHOT OF NOT JUST HIS HAND, but our hands together. Solid Gold in my heart and memories.
I am proud that God chose him to our Dad, proud of any trait I may have inherited from him. He is a good, kind man, who taught us right from wrong, taught us how to work hard, always do our best, and to take PRIDE in anything we laid a hand upon. Be it a task, a job, ourselves, and our country. He was adamant, that we honor those who have fought and died for our right to still be here living in this great country of ours. He still believes that if each one of us in America would get up every morning and try and do one thing to make the world a better place, do what thing that makes this world richer than we found it, he believed we would be able to keep our country great.
LORETTA LYNN sang it best:
They don’t make em like my Daddy anymore; they’ve thrown away the pattern through the years.
In this great big land of freedom.
At a time, we really need em…. they don’t make em like my Daddy ANYMORE.
And they don’t make hands like his anymore either. You would walk a long hard mile to find hands that are calloused from working hard, picking a guitar, and wrenching on machines.