The visit really started for me the moment that I saw her hands. I was immediately mesmerized by the tone of the skin that moved across those hands that have traveled so many years and places. The lines of structure so clearly visible under her thin skin lead my eyes to her knuckles, swollen from the years of labor that they were asked to partake in. Even with these vestiges of time heavy upon them, they appeared beautiful to me. Her skin radiant with the vibrancy of life touched and love offered.
My hands, an echo of hers thirty years younger, wanted to share my mother's pain, even if for only a moment to relieve her. I gently took her h