A Wrinkle In Time

Playing "You've Got to be Kidding" for game night again last night. It's Chago's turn. It's a challenge card, which requires that he find something in the room that best describes the word on the card before the timer runs out.

The word was "wrinkles".

Without a moment's hesitation, he reached out and took my hand.

And I just sat there and stared at him incredulously. Me? Not me! I was stunned. Stunned, I tell you!! I am NOT the first thing that comes to your mind when you think of wrinkles!! No frickin' way!!

And time just stood still for a moment, as the realization of how my children actually see me begins to sink in. As I try to swallow the pill that says I'm now "old" in their eyes. As the truth and inevitability of my own mortality jumps up and slaps me across the face!

And then I'm suddenly flooded with images of my Grandma Queta's hands, whose wrinkles among perfectly manicured and painted (red!) nails, I remember so fondly. Her long slender fingers, her dark skin. They were always so soft, and I always remember thinking how beautiful they were. They seemed worldly to me. The things they'd seen and lived through. The thousands of cheeks they'd pinched, and babies they'd cradled; the family they'd held and comforted and buried; the seeds they'd sown, and meals they'd cooked, and the infinite number of rosaries they'd prayed.

And I miss her so much. And I ache to hold her hands again. And am suddenly not so offended that I see her hands in mine. (Even though I AM only 39!!)

And he just looks up at me with those puppy dog eyes, still cradling my hand in his, and he says, "What's wrong, Mom?"

And Saia, obviously the more sensitive of the two, and certainly way more in tune to my vanity, quickly jumps in and says, "Her hands are NOT wrinkled, Bubba!"

And then (dear God please help my child make it to his next birthday) he says, "Well, I was first gonna choose her face, but I thought she might get mad."

...