These old hands

                                                                                     

 

The hands were folded together, loosely linked, resting in her lap. Her eyes were lightly closed, in a head perched at an uncomfortable angle. I thought to gently hold her narrow shoulders and straighten her posture in the chair, but if I woke her, the consequences could not be predicted.

The woman dosing in the high backed green chair is my mum, and I am visiting with her in the nursing home where she has lived for the past 2 and a half years.

Dementia, that foul thief of memory and independence, spread its pestilence some years ago. Still, she is a fighter, my mumma. Refusing to accept the inevitable decline into a void where people, places, emotions and memories cannot exist. With all the courage and determination she can muster, mum strives to remember, and bullies that failing mind of hers to reach within itself and claim a fading memory or name

The struggle is exhausting. A constant battle to either accept her plight and in that decision, to surrender and submit to her new life in a nursing home, or to rail against the injustice of her sentence and get angry, sometimes really angry.

Sleep is her companion, and with fatigue, can come her emotional unpredictability. Like now, I am caught between an act of kindness to adjust her head and make her more comfortable, and perhaps risk waking her. That decision may result in me being subjected to a tirade of abuse, so perhaps I will leave her to sleep and deal with a crick neck or shoulder later

I sit on the side of the bed, considering these options and possible outcomes. Like the slight movement of a curtain on an otherwise still day, I feel the stare of her blue eyes, observing me

“Who are you?” comes the accusatory query

I’m Cherrie, your daughter”

Í didn’t have daughters”, her emphatic response

 

A ripple in my emotional pond. I dare not feel the pain that reaches up and pulls at my heart strings. I know better than to let that tug infiltrate my emotions.

I tell my string pulling foe, for the umpteenth time” it’s her disease that makes her confused”

“You had 3 daughters mum, Di, Cherrie and Katie, and I am Cherrie “I offer this information guardedly.

“I HAD SONS” her terse reply

There is no point in trying to convince her otherwise, so I sit and stare at those hands that have now unfolded themselves, slowly, and are in the process of brushing a collection of silver streaked brunette hairs behind her dainty ears.

“What are you staring at?” again, the accusatory tone

“Your hands”

‘WHY?

“I was thinking that they have many stories to tell. You’re 86 now. I wonder how these hands have served you and others in all those years. What they have they experienced, what they have been witness to””

“What a load of nonsense that is,”she says, “Why would it be interesting to know about my hands? You are a nut!”

But even as she admonishes me, a stirring of a smile breaks her lips apart.

“Well I know one thing they did; they slapped your naughty bum!”

And with those words uttered, she tossed her head back to allow the laugh to rise up from her belly, and then came the transformation. It was instantaneous. In that change of thought and mindset, there she was, sitting on front of me, my mum. The woman I knew, now knew me!

 

I needed desperately to keep the connection, so encouraged the conversation further

“Was I really a naughty kid mum? Really?

Oh Cherrie, you were stubborn and strong willed. You used to say as a small child, when I wanted to help you...”No, I will myself!”and stick out that determined little chin of yours”

She reached over to place her hand on mine. A moment to share, to capture, to cherish

Her mood was playful and her eyes clear and alert. Mum was present and I pounced on that opportunity to exercise her failing memory and in that process have some quality time with her

 

“So mum” I began, “shall we make a list of some of the things those hands have done, and see what we end up with?”

She stalled. Seemed unconvinced that this was an activity worth pursuing, but graciously indulged me and said

“Cooked”

From that humble beginning, the words flowed fast and fluid. It was like a lock had been opened and the words and memories come flooding forward, faster than I could absorb them. I reached for a pen, and the serviette on her tray from lunch, and began to record her memories

 

In no particular order she mentioned things like cooking lemon meringue pie, or salmon fish cakes, washing clothes in the old twin tub Hoover washing machine, then wringing them out on the wringer attachment on the laundry tubs. Years before such luxury, she had to wash using the copper tub over a fire.  How her red and always chaffed hands ached from wringing out the washing using only her hands!

 Her words flew about us, drawing images above our heads. Mum on her hands and knees on the back verandah at 17 Fennell Street, waxing and polishing the lino by hand. Brooms grasped, beating mats draped over the Hills Hoist for a thrashing. Beds made, lunches packed, shopping carried in string bags that dug into the palms of her hands.

These hands baited hooks and caught fish, erected tents on our holidays to Ulladulla and other beach locations over the Christmas holidays. They built sand castles and collected shells. Explored rock pools, with one hand, while holding a tiny daughters hand in the other. Paid bills, learned to drive a car, played tennis, made the family Christmas pudding using the Keighran recipe, wrote out Christmas and birthday cards. Gardened.

She took a moment to reflect. I watch her examining her own hands and saw the cloud of confusion begin to pass over her.

“Why do my hands look so old” she asked

“Because your 86 mum”

“86! I can’t be. I don’t feel 86, I feel like I’m 40. Am I really 86?” she said, with a look of fear on her face.

Yes”

“God, I’ll be dead soon”

I was fearful that she was lost to me again, or would become melancholy.

We sat quietly, listening to fear tip-toeing around us.  Shallow breathing, eyes downcast. Waiting. Would she disappear to the place that I cannot follow, or would she stay with me.  We waited

It seemed like the longest wait. Like waiting for the first bloom to herald spring after a long, cold winter.  Her head was dropped forward and her crepe paper eyelids fluttered almost closed.

I waited, careful not to disturb her.

“Babies”she exclaimed. I nearly leaped of the bed with surprise

“’I cuddled my babies, my 3 daughters!”she announced triumphantly

The ripple in my emotional pond became a tsunami of joy!

”Diane was premature and small. Like a doll. Cherrie, you were chubby with black hair and looked like a Chinaman, (giggle) and Katie was blonde and blue eyed. I held and cuddled and rocked you all to sleep with these hands”

Yes” tell me more Mumma

 

“Your father joined the Merchant Navy after we were married and was away for months and months at a time. He would write to me describing the ship, the crew, and the sights of the far off exotic places he sailed to. I held all those letters and read them and re read them. I loved receiving his letters and I loved writing back to him. Diane was a small baby when he left, so I wrote of her antics and enclosed photos.  It was the only way of communicating in those days, not like now. But I think is was more romantic”.

Her face looks relaxed, happy to have this memory come to visit, albeit briefly.

We chat a bit more.

“Mum you used to sew beautifully! I  can remember a beautiful pink chiffon dress with a long matching Isadora Duncan styled scarf that you make for Di for her Teachers College ball. Do you remember that?

“Remember it!”Of course I do, it was a bugger of a fabric to sew, slippery and fine textured. It nearly ended up in the garbage bin!

That triggered my own memory of my mum’s sewing days. She was self taught and did a remarkable job. Her Singer Sewing machine would be hauled onto the kitchen table after the breakfast dishes had been cleared, and the tablecloth shaken outside and folded away in the kitchen draw. Dad would have left for work hours earlier and we girls gone to school. She would sew at that table til about 3.30 when the first of us arrived in the door off the bus or train. Depending who the item was for, we would have to quickly get out of our school uniform and slip into the dress/shirt/jacket/ pants/poncho, whatever it was, never complaining about the pins sticking into our skin.

We girls have all at some time, stood on the kitchen table to have a hemline levelled, or darts adjusted.  Modifications noted, the whole lot was packed away, to make room for afternoon tea, and then school books for homework, before the tablecloth was pulled on again and the table set for dinner.

 

Mum had little patience, so I am still in awe of the dresses and gowns she managed to create on our little kitchen table. She was creative. One dress may eventually be re incarnated for another daughter’s school ball or social with a re cut, the addition or removal of sleeves, or adding a belt or jacket.  Her hands were busy and tired, but made sure we girls had beautiful dresses whatever the occasion.

I was surprised to learn that her hands as a young woman had held cigarettes. My mum smoked? Hhmm news to me.

She wasn’t much of a drinker, but in her youth drank Pimms, or a shandy on a hot day, parked outside the pub in the car with us kids, next to the other women in cars, whilst their men drank in the bar! Extraordinary! But her favourite drink was crème de menthe, soda and ice.  Young bar staff these days look blankly at this order, when dad and I take mum out for lunch sometimes. It is a green concoction rarely known. Occasionally an older bar tender will nod knowingly and reach under the bar and put a dusty VOK bottle on the bar and say, haven’t been asked for this for years! She and I talk about the drink nicknamed the Green Lizard

“Mark has strong hands”, she murmurs sleepily

I see sleep beginning to invade. I am selfish. I want more time with her, more opportunities to be with my mother. I am jealous of my competition for her attention. Dementia is always there waiting to reclaim her, pulling her away from me

Her eyes begin to glaze over. A distant look appears on her face, and then I know I have lost for now when she says:

“Who are you?”

I am holding her hand. Her brown, fine, veined hand. I don’t want to let go, but she pulls back and places them once again in her lap. She is asleep and I am alone, but grateful for the stroll we took together down memory lane, thanks to those old hands.