Holding Hands

Victress HItchcock

Photo submitted by the author

Holding Hands

This morning in bed, drinking my milky sweet Irish tea I could feel something expanding in my heart. A memory. A feeling. A sorrow. I sipped my tea and waited. The words hand holding and then holding hands arose in my mind. I sat with them both for a moment, and it became clear that what I was remembering was the image and the feeling of holding hands. Hand holding has a tinge of caretaking, of duty. Holding hands is completely reciprocal. It is an energy conduit, a sharing of love between two humans: love flowing through two hands held with no agenda.

I can think of only a handful of people with whom I have shared this connection. My friend Joe Vest when he was living those last few years with AIDS. I can see us sitting side by side on the sofa in his house in Crestone. It wasn’t a comfortable couch. It was an upright old family heirloom sofa. We would sit next to each other and hold hands. Sometimes half an hour would go by. Not speaking. Just holding hands watching snow fall, or a gust of wind blow leaves across the deck or a family of deer passing by. Our hands were doing all the talking, passing a current of love between us.

Twenty years later I was sitting side by side with my three-year-old grandson at Fairyland in Oakland. We were slowly rocking on a porch swing overlooking the amphitheater and stage where a puppet show was taking place. My feet were nudging us back and forth while Adrian’s legs were outstretched. The puppet show was too far away for us to hear what was going on, but the day was perfect, warm but not hot and there was nowhere else we needed to be. Out of the blue I felt Adrian take my left hand with his warm soft round hand. I glanced over; he was still looking straight ahead. I relaxed back into the slow swaying, and we sat there together for a long time holding hands and nothing needed to be said. My heart beat deep and wide and I softened and expanded, and love flowed wordless and at ease.

When I think back to the times when I tried to hold my husband’s hand in the years before we separated, I remember it felt like holding a cold slab of meat. There was no life, no connection between us. No love was flowing. It was only a matter of time before I would give up trying to ignite a feeling between us.

There is a kindness that I am finding more accessible as I get older. I am less self-conscious. I am feeling a tentative but real letting go of wanting something more. I am more willing to reach out and hold someone’s hand––my daughter, my son, my grandchildren, a friend. I can see how the discomfort I have felt all my life was a disconnect passed down through my ancestors. No one felt comfortable just being with each other. No one knew how to live and communicate in a non-conceptual space. Unconditional love was not included in my family’s comfort zone. Being that vulnerable was way too scary.

There is something so ordinary and something so extraordinary about being able to be with someone in a space where there are no thoughts, now words, only a feeling of love.

Victress Hitchcock grew up in London, Paris and Madrid as the daughter of a diplomat. She was a filmmaker for 45 years. Victress lives in Colorado and is a meditator, poet, writer, teacher, mother and grandmother. Her memoir A Tree With My Name On It: Finding a Way Home was published by Bold Story Press in October, 2024. It won the Colorado Authors League 2025 Memoir Award. You can read more about her creative work at victresshitchcock.com.