Honouring our hands

I’m washing my hands
as if I never saw them
Dear hands, I love you!

Covid-19 made me look differently at my hands. Don’t we often just rush through the days, taking our hands for granted, not caring much about them? While I’m worried my fingers are not long and slender enough to showcase rings, I forget that they hold my coffee cup for me every morning, 365 days a year. Year after year. 

This was not the first time I had such an “awakening” moment about my hands. It also happened when I did the jeweller training, spending many hours behind the workbench, watching closely how my hands struggled to hold new tools, making new movements and understanding new grips.

All crafts, whether that is in metal, wood, clay, textile or something else, have the same learning process: our brains have a vision of what we want to do and our hands have to execute it. It takes a while to have all that come together.

Hands are loyal friends. They keep a muscle memory, so if you know how to crochet with yarn, your hands will know how to crochet with metal wire. There is more resistance, but the hands know what they are expected to do.

Those of us who have hands that serve us, let’s not forget to honour them and be grateful for what they do for us. And what they may still learn to do, in the future!

If you could choose one more thing that your hands could learn, what would that be?

I have always liked the idea of mixing hard metals with soft techniques. This year, my theme for the A to Z challenge is “Metal meets textile”. From A to Z, I talk about work with metal wire, textile techniques like crochet and knitting, show some pieces I’ve been working on, share some thoughts on metal, textile and jewellery. I hope that you’ll find something of interest to you!

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