By Abby Berman Mazenod

When I become a mother.

I want my daughter to know,

My son to know,

My children to know,

All children to know,

How important it is to be unique.

Because we are who we are.

We create what we are meant to create.

And with this thought, I need to explain to you…

That I love my hands;

My hands that write.

And you should love yours too.

These beautiful hands,

They play,

They create,

They form,

They have worked hard.

These hands communicate what voice cannot.

These hands are beautiful to me.

But they are not perfect…

My middle finger on my right hand,

It is misshapen.

It has felt the work that these hands have done.

It has felt the love that these hands have felt.

It has been the sacrifice for creativity and communication and beauty and love.

This finger

It is ugly.

And when I paint my nails it is the one to stab me.

It is still beautiful.

In its sacrifice,

In its life.

Its beautiful misshapen life.

We need to know what we are willing to give.

We need to know what we are willing to give up for the greater cause.

We need to know that creativity overpowers vanity.

We need to understand that beauty is not visual or physical.

It is important, possibly the most important, to understand,

That in this life,

This modern technicolor life,

There are things that are worth sacrifice.

Things like my hands.

My beautiful misshapen hands.

xoxo-Abby