The Little Girl has Perfect Hands

One of my high school teachers told us, "The most beautiful hands on earth are those of a mother's hands." She explained that a mother's hands had roughened for all the house chores she'd done. Despite the roughness of her hands, they are still beautiful, and always will. I had always remembered those words, and I wanted to have those set of hands.

When I was in school, my friends would always tell me how smooth my hands were. I graduated and started working. One of my colleagues was poor. We were not rich, but I lived a much more comfortable life than she did. However, my colleague thought that I was very rich and spoiled. She would always insultingly tell other colleagues how comfortable my life was and how princess-like I was. It bothered me. I could do some house chores such as cleaning, fixing my bed, and washing my own underwear. Although my parents wanted to spoil me, I didn't think I was a "princess." At that point, I made up my mind to wash all my clothes. My parents would always use our washing machine to wash our clothes. However, our washing machine was old and malfunctioning, and I wanted to save energy, so I hand wash all of my clothes instead.

Months later, I had quit my job and had worked somewhere else. I washed my own clothes once a week. I felt better for being more responsible and independent. However, my hands had roughened. I would occasionally have those ugly blisters, and my hands would hurt. Everyone that I tried to hold hands with would get surprised with my very rough hands. I attended a wedding reception one time, and when we were about to leave, my parents shook hands with the groom’s parents. I hid my hand behind my back. I was so conscious of my hands.

I did wear gloves when I was doing the laundry, but I didn’t wear them when I was washing my underwear. My hands hurt, so I decided to wear gloves every time I did other house chores. Some weeks later, my blisters started to disappear. I had religiously worn gloves whenever I did the laundry, no matter how tiny the clothing was. Now, my hands are smooth again! I realized one thing: my hands can work as hard as those of a mother’s, but they can still be as soft as a princess’. The little girl now has a perfect set of hands!