Lately I’ve been enthralled with my fingertips. Okay, I admit enthralled is a bit over-the-top. And it’s not that there’s anything special about my fingertips; they just happen to be the ones I notice the most, the ones I can move at will, the ones I’ve realized are the perfect meeting of nail and skin. So I encourage you to look at your own. Notice the shape, the color, the design, how sensitive, perceptive, even ageless they are. What they’ve done for you throughout the day. Turned the pages in a book, traced the outline of a face, tested the temperature of the water, shuffled a deck, wiped a tear, played a tune, signed a check, snapped a beat.
This morning mine were blueberry stained. I wish I had the words to describe the pure pleasure of seeing them so. We’d gone to pick blueberries in Nesbit, MS last night; five of us secretly competing to gather the most, saying little, admitting to feeling greedy, (their side has more!), totally absorbed in picking off one by one the perfectly round, tight, ashy-blue berries, popping the best into our mouths, filled with the contentment that comes only from working in a field that so generously yields up its fruit. Grateful for the shade, the comraderie of others, the sense of doing something worth doing, arguing over the best way to eat them. A pie. A cobbler. Muffins. Just as they are.
This would have been impossible without the fingertips. As would so much else that we depend on them for. If I were a poet, I’d write a sonnet: Ode to the Fingertips. Perhaps my friend Cindy will do it for me. If I were an artist, I’d paint a picture of purple- stained fingers holding the perfect berry. Maybe Mike or Sue will do that. Sarah Emily could write a song. All I can do is bring the topic up, ramble on, hint at something I can’t express, hope that you’ll just trust me and take just a few seconds to look for yourselves at your own, to be in awe, to say to God, “Thank you.”
4 comments:
No "Ode to Fingertips" in my writer's toolbox, but yes, much gratitude... how else would I type? Those fingertips supported my husband and I in the early years of our marriage when I was a transcriptionist. And years before that, they brought me such joy at the piano, and at the sewing machine with my grandmother. And even though I'm not much of a cook, how else would we feel the dough as we kneed it? What a lovely observation you've called us all to, Terry! Thank you.
"purple-stained fingers", wow. thank you Terry! the image has been added to my 'things to paint' list. i will let you know how it turns out.
There was a bank teller that used to really get on my nerves. I would find my temper starting to boil whenever I had to deal with her.
Then one day, I noticed her hands. Instead of getting aggravated, I began to imagine all that those hands had done over time, who they had held, the food they had cooked, the gentle loving touches they had made. My whole attitude changed to one of appreciation.
I didn't see her much after that. She wasn't there and I stopped banking there. I still, however, occasionally stop and think about her hands and the gift God gave me that day.
Rachel,
That's a great idea. I have a student I need to imagine growing up to become a blessing - to help MY attitude.
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