Touching

He touched me so tenderly. We went to a Moby concert Friday night. Hot, packed in, sweaty, drunk, stoned people were all around us. One of my friends and our little boy were standing close by. My husband reached out and stroked the back of my hair. It was a light, tender touch, my favorite kind. He sort of gently twisted a lock of my hair as we watched the show. That touch reminds me of a butterfly or a summer breeze. That kind of touch makes you want to lean your head back, close your eyes, and sigh. I don’t think he’ll ever know how good it felt.

It’s not just the feel of his fingers alone, it’s also the unspoken message there. Somehow that touch whispers love and admiration, tenderness and care. It feels like a touch when you’re first dating someone and they’re infatuated with you. And that touch reminded me of my daughter and her new husband. Early in their relationship I remember being in the car with them. We pulled in some place to do something and were talking for a moment. Her husband-to-be reached over and twirled the edge of her hair as we chatted. That’s one of those moments that convinced me he loved her. I could tell he was trying to pay attention to what we were saying and he was trying to be casual about caressing her hair… as if it were absent minded fidgeting. But I could also tell that he just adored her. He found the feel of her hair to be like sweet silk on his finger tips. I got the impression that he could have sat in his car stroking her hair for eternity and still found something new to love about it. That’s one of the moments I thought maybe I could let him “have her.” I thought I had found someone that would love her even more than I do.

I think that’s what we all want for our children. We want them to find someone who will love them more than we do. That’s why I’m not too crazy about my other son-in-law. I don’t feel like he treasures my oldest daughter the way he should. (Typical mother-in-law, aren’t I?)

In my case the competition was not tough. My mother has this little blurb that she’s said several times. “I was a great daughter to my parents and tried to be who they wanted me to be, and I was a wonderful wife to my husband and added a lot of joy to his life. Unfortunately I wasn’t such a great parent and could have done better for my kids. But, two out of three ain’t bad.” And she says this in all seriousness, like we should say, “Oh yeah, Mom, you’re right. Overall you’ve done a great job in your life.” And maybe we could say that if we were just her friends, or her parents, or her husband; but we’re her kids and she doesn’t seem to grasp that the third in the two out of three was our life! My husband always shudders when she says that and now has gotten to saying it in jest when my mother does something ridiculously uncaring.

Some years ago we had an apartment fire. Fortunately we had insurance so life was not as torn apart as it could have been, but we were very shook up and had to live in a hotel until we could find a new apartment. The fire came on in the middle of the night because the boy that lived below us left some combustibles in front of a space heater then snuck out his window to go to a party. My mother was out of town on an Elderhostile at the time. I finally tracked her down and I asked her to come see us when she finished up her Elderhostile. I told her I really needed her right then. She tried to get out of it by claiming there was nothing she could do to help but I told her just having her there would make me feel so much better. Her answer… “But I can’t! I have to lead exercise class when I get back. They’re counting on me.”

When my brother was teetering on the brink of detox for his cocaine habit, his wife called my mom to let her know he had just checked in to the hospital. She wanted to give my mom the number so she could call my brother and encourage him as well as bring my Mom up to date on how my brother was doing. Mom interrupted my sister-in-law mid-sentence and said, “I can’t stay on right now, my massage therapist is at the door.”

There is little that feels touching about my relationship with my Mom and there’s so much that’s touching in my relationship with my own daughters. I can only chalk it up to the touch of God in my life. I’ve had a relationship with God since I was seventeen… not always what it should have been, but I truly believe He’s touched my life the way my husband so wonderfully touched my hair and I feel God is gently twisting my life so that my joy will someday be complete.