My Daddy's Hands

Have you ever stopped to think about your hands?  Just a palm and five fingers at the end of two arms.  As you look closer you see lines, which are distinctive to each person who has hands and fingers. Hands are amazing. How useful our hands are!  And yet we forget to appreciate them.

We use our hands for everyday trivial matters; combing our hair, greeting a stranger, painting a picture, and to put words on a paper that will be held as it is read. Hands have been involved in the cause and execution of historical events… some of which have changed the world.

My father was a mechanic all of his life. He had permanent stains in the folds of his knuckles, and in his fingerprints. No matter how hard he scrubbed, the mark of a mechanic was there. His hands were rough and callused. And he seemed to always have a sore or a cut caused from squeezing his hands into a machine. And yet my father’s hands were healing hands.  He would fix whatever ailments that vehicle had, and he would do it with patience and care.

On the day they were wed, my Dad took my mother’s hands into his and vowed to always be there for her, to help fix and heal whatever issues came along.

On the day that my sister was born, and later myself… he held our tiny bodies in his hands and promised to heal all of our hurts and take care of us for as long as he lived.

As we grew, he did just that.  He held our hands as we walked beside him. He cared for our cuts, scrapes, and even the emotional bruises. I can recall so many times that he would pat us on the shoulder and tell us that we were good kids and he was proud of us.  His hands, along with his arms, would wrap around us as he would say that he loved us. We would watch as he would take my mother into his arms to hug and kiss her at random moments, “just because”.  

As a little girl, I spent much of my time in the garage with him. As I grew taller, I was able to reach the pedals and all the pretty little knobs across the dash, which meant I could finally help him! When I could finally stand next to the car and see into the belly of the beast that lies under the hood... that’s when I was allowed to hold the flashlight in my hands, and help Dad see what he was doing with his. And so he began to teach me how to care for cars, the way he cared for them; teaching me that caring for a machine meant that the machine would care for you.  Dad took my little hands into his, and guided them.

I can recall a time when we were camping and had taken a 4-wheel ATV with us. I was still quite small, but just tall enough to reach the handlebars and the pedals… I was also old enough to recognize that the letters "S-T-A-R-T" meant that the engine would fire up.  Dad used his hands to propel himself up and out of the lawn chair that he was sitting in.

As children sometimes do, we continued to grow. When my heart was broken by my first high school crush, it was my Daddy’s hand that gently wiped the tear from my cheek reminding me that I would always be loved, no matter what the world did to me.

As a teenager I remember our family vacations consisted of road trips through the South. Dad’s hands would grip the steering wheel as he guided the large RV on the interstate and mountain roads, while I sat next to him, reading the map. As a family on vacation, touring museums and towns- I would purposely walk behind my parents because seeing my parents holding each other’s hand was my favorite view.

When I moved away from home, it was Daddy’s hands that took mine and my mother’s as we prayed together before I left. And his hands would wave in the air enthusiastically every time I returned for visits.  Even as adults, daddy’s hands would continue to frequently pat my sister and I on the shoulder and hug us as he told us that he was proud of us and that he loved us.

In 2006, Dad went to the ER on Thanksgiving Day due to pain that he believed was caused by kidney stones. The stones were there but there was something more.  Doctors discovered a mass on his kidney and therefore removed his kidney later that day. But his blood levels continued to show signs of cancer and Prostate Cancer was the next to appear.

The Cancerous cells then metastasized and spread across his spine and skull. The Chemotherapy he was taking affected his nerves and sat him down in a wheelchair for around a month.  His only complaint? He couldn’t reach the things that needed fixing.

It didn’t take long before Dad decided that he did not want to live the rest of his life confined to a wheel chair, and he refused to continue the chemotherapy. As the chemicals cleared his body, his strength started to come back and he was able to walk again.  Everything appeared to be well, but the threat of cancer was still very strong.

In February of this year, his hands began to grow weaker as cancer took its toll. A stroke would be the reason he would no longer use his right hand. We entered into the month of March with the knowledge that his kidney (he only had one) was failing him. In mid-March, he took his final breath as my mother, my aunt, and I stood beside him holding his hands.

An abundance of friends and family came to the funeral services to show their love and support for my family and for my Dad. He had been an important part of each of their lives and had been a guiding hand for so many. 

I walked beside my mother as she carried his urn through the cemetery that day. She looked down at it with tears in her eyes as she said to me, “I get to hold him one last time.”

Here is a song that my sister and I both love.  "Daddy's Hands" by Holly Dunn.