Holding Tight

My middle child placed his hand over mine today, laying my hand flat on my thigh while he covered my hand with his.

He turned his hand over and over, spread it wide to match my fingers with his own. We were at a school function so neither of us could speak. We were supposed to be focused on whatever the speaker in front of us was saying.

I couldn’t say, “look how small your hand is compared to mine.”

I couldn’t say, “where did you get that scratch?”

So instead, I watched, and he peered closely at our two hands. I could see the wheels turning in his 7 year old mind.

Mama’s hands.

I have vivid memories of my mother’s hands. I write about them more often than her hair. Her smile. Her freckles. I write about how she painted her nails and pressed her cuticles back just so. The blue veins that ran over the tops of her long “piano” fingers. Or so they seemed to me. I write about how lovely they always were to me, and in comparison, my hands were small and chubby. Thick and clumsy.

And I know I did the same to my mother as my middle did to me today. Because her hands are the clearest memory I have of her.

After my mom died I struggled with the concept of her not being a part of the living for her as much as for me and those I loved around me. I was sad that she missed so many lovely moments.

I lose tears now over her not being here to take my sons’ hands in hers. I wish I could watch her hands, more lines running through them, grasp one of my boys’ hands in hers. I wonder at how different life could be if she had lived to meet them.

A person can get lost in death.

Lost in the missing.

Lost in grief.

My middle folded his fingers through mine, clasping them tight. I looked down at our hands intertwined and blinked as I bumped my arm against his.

He grinned at me in the silence.

Don’t let Mama get lost.

I sometimes tell the boys to prevent me from losing sight of them. And he hasn’t.

I am there in his sight line, his hand holding tight.