My right hand is still swollen  and itchy. ( I have an antibiotic cream which will hopefully fix it.)

In the meantime if it wasn’t  fizzing and throbbing and making me a little crazy, I would be bizarrely  enjoying the fact that just for a short while I have my old hand back.

Because it is swollen right across the back all the wrinkles and veins have disappeared.  It’s a bit sad really……

The other hand looks worn and ancient. I have never taken care of my hands. I blame it on “Little Women”. The father of the family in particular. As I was the oldest girl with 3 younger sisters.( no disrespect meant to my younger brother 😀)

I obviously identified strongly with Meg.

When her father came home from the war he complimented her on her work worn hands and said he was proud of her.

How stupid is it that when you are young you form opinions and they stick with you without ever being questioned . But that got in my head and stuck.” Work worn hands were better than beautifully kept ones.”

And so I took pride in never wearing rubber gloves, never used moisturiser, never even considered having a manicure.

Oh dear!! Like several other things in my life, if I hadn’t  looked at it being either/ or…… then I wouldnt be looking  at my swollen hand , comparing it to my other one and thinking,” it didn’t  have to be this way. I could have considered that rubber gloves probably hadn’t been invented when that book was written. And moisturiser is cheap now. Not a luxury .

On the other hand ( no pun intended)  I look at my old hand and it’s my life story that shows. Even the scar from when I climbed up on the dresser and it fell on top of me. I was only about 6 at the time. I was lucky to escape with only a cut on my hand. 

That incident in” Little Women”really stuck.

Apart from musing about my hand today a little nice thing happened in the corsa.

Someone stopped me and asked me if my name was spelled with an “e” at the end. I said,” yes” and they said they were writing a book, smiled and walked on. I grinned all the way to the farmacia behind my mask. How cool was that!!

I finally went up the pink brick road and took photos of the trees at either side of the scene I had begun drawing and finished what I had started from life. I am pleased with it.

There were over 200 new cases of the virus in Basilicata today.

I appreciate being able to still be relatively free.

And now it’s wine time. Being left handed, I will not have a problem holding a glass…….

Cheers 🍷🍷