your hands give everything away

Yes they do. I look like I am twenty-four, but I am obviously not - just need you to look at my hands. My skin is rough and scaly, tan, my knuckles are covered with folds of knuckle-skin, and when I close my fingers my knuckles cause those gaps in between my fingers. If I am ever afraid of not being able to enter a club for over-eighteens (yes I have been stopped before, dagnabit!) I just need to flash my fingers, hopefully with some red nail polish and a ring on my right middle finger - I should probably have very little problems thereafter.


I used to protect my hands more, when the age discrepancy was wider, as in, my hands looked thirty while I was only twenty-four. Now, I hardly do, for if my hands look thirty while I am now twenty-seven, it should be okay by this time. When I do need to take care of my hands, I have hand creams which work well on feet too, by the way, cracked heels and all that. The latest hand cream I just completed usage of, is a weird branded green tub of white non-scented cream which I bought from Guardian at $25. It is very good! almost comparable to your Jurliques and Crabtree's La Source and what have you. Meanwhile, I have given up the use of gloves during housework, and I have given up noticing the damage, if any, to my hands. My hands, cuticles and left fingertips are rough, yes I snag all those fancy satin material types, so keep them away from me. Cal's hands are smoother than mine. A friendly back rub leaves territorial scars. As I type, there are still acrylic paint stains on my both my hands.


So, those are my hands. Don't we notice also, the hands of those we work with and are surrounded by? I like Miss Cassandra's hands, because though she looks like a cute boy, she has very nice feminine, nurturing, and capable hands. I am sure they will go far. I notice H's hands - his nails and cuticles are, and have been worse than mine. The only time they were ever better was after the first and only manicure he ever had, administered my me in my own home spa. But his hands tell it all too - they are hands that can make him both a successful farmer and an avid venture capitalist. Shuyi has whitish hands, sometimes very well manicured with a pedigree ring, her nails more pointed than squarish like mine. Miss Enid also has similar hands, whitish, small for sure, and with a silver minimalist ring. There are some hands I will always remember- to name a few, I remember Nelson's hands, they are big even though to me he is always my small brother. Some people have very cold hands, like Shanna, the girl from my secondary three class - she touched my hand with hers and that immediately broke the ice and meant that she forgave me (she was a Christian who I gave a dressing-down to because I hated kids who proselytised openly on the streets back then). And I hate sweaty hands, and I am sorry to shake them if I have to.


But I am glad that my hands tell of my age or more, because I rather be a xiao jie than a xiao mei (which anyway I haven't been for years). Having older hands indicates and affirms that I have the spending power (though not very much currently, boo hoo, but I pretend very well), I can walk up to Clarins and the like, and they know I am not kidding when I need to buy Multi-Active Day/Night Cream (which protects against premature ageing by the way, I have been using it for years).


Anyway there are so many hand jokes. "Anything more than a handful is a waste" and all that. I remember my primary school friend Tienwei opened out his hand to gesture while saying, "So how... big is that?" when we were talking about the bra size of a particular lass who I now have no recollection of exactly anymore. So we see some things in alphanumeric, and those more involved think in terms of their handfuls.


I know sculpting is harder for me than painting is, because my knuckles hurt when I strain them bending too much. Just as they do when I play carrom, or when I had finished writing four essays for each of my exams during school days, or when I simply bend them to wield and flex them. Hence I rather type, and paint. I even play the guitar and the piano with my hands largely wrongly sprawled.


Whichever. For I am not a very hands-on person ultimately. Tonight, perhaps I will slather on hand cream.