I just realized that I hadn’t posted yesterday!
I have been hard at work (avoiding) preparing a message for this weekend (on aging!!).
So, in lieu of a belated new post, here is my contribution, from over five years ago.
Now to get a handle on this message …
Although I am only thirty-nine (with four years experience) I am becoming more acquainted with aging, and it’s changes each and every day.
There are some changes that come with ‘time passing on’ (this is hubby’s way of referring to aging) that I quite like.
I love the lines that are forming just outside of the corners of my mouth, and my eyes, because they are evidence to smiles and laughs. I may not remember every individual event that caused my face to smile, but the lines will never hide that joy has filled my days.
I love that I have been plucking my eyebrows for so many years that the hairs almost never re-grow anymore.
I love that I do not have to concern myself with pimples, other than the odd one or two.
I love that, because my hair is … silvering … I have a natural excuse to become an even more blond, and I now have a 
number(s) to identify and define my hair color 😉
There are also some changes that have occurred that I do not favor so much.
I do not like that my knees have decided I need to pay more attention to them, and they attain my attention in the most uncomfortable of ways.
I do not like that some foods that I ingest want to burn themselves into my memory (or at least into my esophagus).
I definitely do not like the anticipation of body parts migrating in a southerly direction.
But, I especially do not like that the appearance of my hands is changing.
The famous, all-knowing ‘they’ say that the way to most accurately guess the age of woman, you need to only to glance at her neck or her hands.
As each year passes, I have noticed subtle changes happening in my hands, that I am not so happy about. The lines in them are deepening. They need constant re-hydration from rich lotions. I seem to have lost the ability to grown my fingernails to even the slightest length, without their splintering. There seems to be more skin, as it is losing it’s youthful elasticity. They sometimes even ache … but it is their appearance that is more disheartening to me.
It is a frequent occurrence that I glance at my hands, and have no idea whose hands they are. They surely cannot be mine, because mine do not look so … so … aged. Then I realize they move when and where I will them, and so they truly are my own.
Maybe the changes in them bother me, because my hands were the body part(s) that I actually liked about myself. Maybe I thought I would be immune to the normal, natural results of ‘time moving on.’
All that said, maybe the wrinkles, the lines, the shorter nails and the loosening skin are all characteristics of hands that have been held by generations before me, that have held on to the children I gave birth to, that have made meals for those I love, that have held the hands of people readying for eternity, that have written or typed words of encouragement, that have touched the shoulder of one carrying the weight of the world, that have folded in an act of pray, that have been kissed by the man of my life, that will one day be taken by my Redeemer as He welcomes me into eternity.
Maybe they are like the laugh lines I so adore on my face. Maybe they are the lines of hands that have loved, and been loved in return.
So, I’ll keep slathering rich lotions onto them, so that, although they will be marked by the lines of time, they will still be welcoming to the touch of those who need a hand.
itsawonderfilledlife 