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[ 4 Minute read ]
Don't shake hands, wave instead
I have a book open before me. In it, it says that a person with a coarse, clumsy and thick hand, with a heavy palm and short fingers, an elementary hand formation, has the lowest type of mentality.
'Okay, infants. Come here. Show me your hands. Oh dear! Not one clever one among you!'
'Now then, children, according to this book, you need long, angular and bony hands. It is a philosophic hand shape. If you have this bony hand shape, kids, it means you will gain wisdom but not money.'
They went back to dipping their hands in paint and sticking them to paper laid on the floor. My bare-footed wife hopped around and trod on each piece of paper that rose into the air, until their hands came free. Some of the cuddly toys had made their paw-prints too. She spared me an arched-eyebrow haughty glance. Hand prints was my idea. She has long, angular and bony hands. She also has opinions, an excellent memory, and a brilliant sense of timing. Which is why later, when I cuddle up to her in bed, I shall make the decision not to buy her a gift tomorrow. She will not have money from selling my gift; that much is true. She doesn't sell them; she keeps them all - to remind me who I am.
During my ambling around the village, I like to cheerily greet the locals. After a while, I notice a strange hand-gesture that indicates that they want to carry on with walking their dogs or something. Their half-closed hand rises from their side and comes up to their stomach, almost reaching their chest and then drops back down to their sides. It is a sign that they are uncomfortable.
I like to sing and fancy that I might break into spontaneous singing in the street this Autumn. The problem is that too many people still remember what Elvis Presley sounded like and they might think I am a charlatan, a pretender. I am a crooner, so some Country might work. Of course, I shall have to be selling Hot Potatoes from a hand-barrow as a reason to be standing outside. I would be looking for gentlemen in top hats to touch their hats and nod at me, and ladies in long dresses catching their breath with one hand while they hold their wide-brimmed, lace trimmed hats with the other. I fancy a hansom carriage might pass, with a generous and cheery benefactor aboard.
The locals in my village slowly hurry off. I see it as rude desperation. They, to me, seem ill-equipped to end a conversation amicably. What they have done, I feel, is not given enough effort to the discourse. They have not given enough of themselves into a real-time moment and have lost control of the direction the moment might take. I am, of course, boring them.
'Bravo!' A shower of coins thrown my way. My gaze might leave the blushing ladies and be cast down to the ground.
'Ah! Hugo, you scamp!' I might expect Hugo, my four-year-old neighbour to be hoping to share in good fortune. He has an eye for serendipity and a quick podgy hand. The twinkling of silver has changed to only brown. He isn't stealing, he has not yet comprehended individual possession. Later, he will swap some coins for caterpillars or something with the bigger boys in flat caps and bare feet.
Alternatively, the village locals are overwhelmed with useless information. I give them information that has no value. It cannot be exchanged for something else. It is non-transferable.
These are not people who are browsing in a Victorian market lit by candle-light and lanterns, who are keeping an eye out for an amusing gim-crack or gew-gaw. They are instead, seemingly, half-conscious.
It is odd to me that people want to be asleep while they are awake. When I next see the little hand gesture that indicates that they are about to slam the door on communication, I shall look more closely at the shape of it. Here then, is where the real problem lies. I am reading them like they imagine a psychiatrist might. They don't want to give anything away that might incriminate them, or get them in trouble. Plainly, I missed the lesson on how to make banal conversation that never breaks the veneer of privacy, and the lesson that focuses on never giving facts as friendly conversation.
Most alarming is this: When I am at home there is no noise from a radio or television, a phone, or music player. When I do answer the phone and have a short conversation, and the call ends, the silence is heavy and pervasive. It distracts me from studying or focusing on anything. That is not to say that I could focus on anything that was not the phone call. No, unfortunately, for a brief time I was awoken from my secret slumber and now I have no noisy distraction again. i am suffering withdrawal symptoms. I, it seems, am a junkie. Worse, I am a pusher.
That hand that both cheerily and sadly waves goodbye, also uses the same wave to say 'No, thanks!'