P Is For Prune

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This old gal…

Noticed her hands while driving…a phrase emerging that she’d used as a tyke…whispering together with other kids…giggling…hehe-ing…referring to old ladies…as shriveled old prunes…it’s not funny…but it kind of is…because…looking at those hands…one of us is…shriveling up…like a wrinkly old prune…

Have watched these hands…change…morph…age…more closely than the face in the mirror…these hands…teacher hands…pointing at this…writing that…modeling for little readers…how to track print…36 years…times 180 days…times 40 students or so a year…point point point…can’t help…but have seen the transformation…happen…over time…

And it’s not just the hands…it’s the…I worshiped the sun with baby oil as a teen…crepey skin…everywhere…the legs…the arms…the feet…wrinkling…shriveling up…getting pruny…but prunes…not as pretty as their former plum self…hearty old souls that they are…still…have worth…still…have value…still…have lots…to offer…
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And this shriveled up old prune…agrees…