Touch
My mother’s friend hugged me today. She kissed my cheek and I kissed hers. Her skin was soft and perfumed, her touch so comforting. We were meeting after many years and I was grateful for that tight hug.
The morning my mum died, I lightly hugged her – she was in too much pain for anything more robust. I stroked her hair and the nurse gestured to me not to. Local custom holds that stroking the head prevents the spirit from easily leaving the body. But I couldn’t help it. Mum’s hair was soft as silk. Her face had taken on the look of death already and it was hard to look at it. So I hugged her gently. Later that afternoon, she took a couple of shallow breaths and no more. Again, I instinctively bent to kiss her head and the nurse gestured No, more violently this time. But it had been so long since I’d touched her with gentleness or love. The last months had been full of frustration and helplessness, and it had become easier to handle her body impersonally than to believe that this limp, incoherent, blind woman was my headstrong, opinionated, argumentative mother. So that afternoon, I stroked her soft hair for the last time and let her go.
I read an article recently that spoke of independence and single women. It spoke of frustration that the world was desperate to match them with another human being. Of anger at the assumption that everyone needs someone. Many people are content in themselves, and in their existence independent of others. More power to them. However, this hasn’t been my experience. I had a rough time during my adolescence. After many years of hiding behind sarcasm and downright bitchiness, I found love, married young, had children, and rediscovered my humane side.
Touch is so important to me. More than declarations of love or physical acts of love, it is the small touches that make my existence worthwhile. To have no one to touch or no one to touch you seems to me a singular bereavement. I wonder about recently divorced or widowed friends, people who have shared their beds and couches with someone else. I know my dad craves human contact. He has just lost his companion of sixty four years. Though she was not particularly demonstrative or even affectionate in public, I don’t dare imagine what the loneliness must feel like. He breaks down on the rare occasions I hug him. There is a barrier of old memories between us that I can’t breach. I wish I knew how to be physically affectionate with him like I am with my girlfriends or family.
It might be karma or just natural progression. My children, once the generous givers of the best hugs and cuddles, now, more often than not, push me away gently. I cherish the rare unguarded hug they offer. Is this why middle aged parents look forward to grandchildren? To hold a little person again, no tension in the fragile bones, the vulnerable skull, the eyelashes sweeping down over a lax mouth?
Humans aren’t the only ones who can give and receive comfort in a touch. A cat curling in an S around the ankles, all softly sinuous. Another cat, vibrating with a deep purr as it sits, paws neatly tucked in, tail curled around itself. A dog, leaning heavily against the legs, begging to be scratched, who’s a good dog then, or jumping up with paws around the shoulders, tail frantically waving, lolloping tongue. The touch of an animal is special. The cat that slumbers in your lap, or the dog sprawled across your feet have given their human the most precious gift of all – trust. In a perfect world, every lonely human would find every lonely cat or dog…
It seems these days that touch is disturbingly talked about mainly in reference to abuse. Child abuse, sexual abuse, oh we live in terrible times. Still, it is lovely to hear about kindergartners who interact with residents in old people’s homes or dogs brought in as therapy for patients with degenerative disorders. I am convinced that a lot of the therapy is due to the physical contact. Life sized knitted baby dolls were distributed in a residence for people with Alzheimer’s Syndrome. The elderly patients cuddled and cared for the dolls so lovingly. To some of them, it brought back memories of their own babies. To others, the doll represented human touch and love.
I hope to grow old being touched lovingly and having some loved one to touch. That would be the greatest gift of all. How easy it is to offer and receive this comfort. And yet, sometimes it is the hardest thing to do.