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| Subject: Without Touch | |
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Author: Judy |
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Date Posted: 23:40:01 04/17/05 Sun She lifts her shirt, displaying her back, tanned and peeling from too much sun in Australia. There’s a hole in the ozone there, she says, and apologizes for the grossness of her skin. The flaking chunks of skin bother me less than something else I notice. I see shrunken flesh on her bone-thin frame. She is starving, but not for food. Like a plant that has withered for lack of water, her body has gone too long without touch. Her cells are dying, desperate for affection, contracting for lack of love. She hands me the lotion. I squirt some onto my hand and begin to rub it in. Once upon a time, I might have felt self-conscious to touch another woman’s body. I have no such compunctions now. She starts to lower her shirt, but I say, no, there’s still this area over here, on the right. I am stalling. I want to feed her whatever small morsels I can. It makes me sad, this way we have of subsisting without touch. Our society says that only people in relationships deserve it. If you are between relationships, you must mostly survive without. You can have flings to have your sexual needs met. But if you don’t like this option, even soft caresses or long hugs that make you melt, are forbidden without a lover. Our civilization has evolved to say that touch without a specific kind of love, a specific kind of hope, is bad. We are left to crave, left to starve. She asks me for hugs often and I give them, transferring as much love as I can. My sister's wedding shower. My mother’s friends fill the banquet room at the Costa Mesa country club. Many have known me for more than a good part of my life. As I greet each one, I am conscious of the way they hug or kiss me. Some are perfunctory. Their lips barely graze my cheek. Or their arms reach around me, but they avoid contact with the rest of my body. Others are more willing to linger. Especially with these women, I notice that when I hug them, I try to give out a part of me. My grandmother is also here. She is 93, hunched from osteoporosis, shrunken to barely more than 4 feet tall. Luckily, her mind is sharp. We are close and I appreciate that she is present, still aware, still living on this earth. But at the shower, I find myself thinking about her body. How long has it been since someone fed her with physical love? Her husband, my grandfather, whom she fell in love with when she was 12, died prematurely 24 years ago when a man robbed and shot him in a parking lot. Quick to make friends, my grandmother has had several male companions since then. But though one wanted to marry her, none were lovers. For her, there was only one. So today, I hug her tightly whenever she reaches for me. After the shower and the dinner that follows at my parent’s house, I walk her to my aunt’s car. As my grandmother slowly pushes her walker, navigating the step that leads from the front door to the walkway, and around the bush in front of the garage, I place my hand on her back. I leave it there until she abandons her walker and clings tightly to my hand to climb into the front seat. My aunt pulls the seat belt over her frail body and I lean down to hug her. Before, uncomfortable with her neediness, I might have disentangled as soon as possible. But this time, I stay for as long as she wants. [ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ] |
| Subject | Author | Date |
| beautiful | me | 17:52:20 04/18/05 Mon |