It'sGreg
StoryBoard – HyperBob
Text by Rob Harper (HyperBob)
The problem with my hands is this; I don’t have any cuticles. You know
those little white crescents on the fingernail that look so good on
hands that have had an expensive manicure. When I see cuticles I think
to myself, now there’s a person who looks after themselves. There is
someone with a lot of free time on their hands. I somehow get to
thinking that you can’t have a very busy life if you have cuticles
showing on every finger. I could be wrong.
A girlfriend of mine said she would push the hard skin back to reveal
the cuticles. She called them little smiles and said I would have five
of them on each hand. She said I need more smiles in my life. She
said I would love it. I hated it.
She noticed a small white fleck on my fingernail and said I needed
more calcium, and wanted me to drink milk. She had read in a magazine
that milk had lots of calcium in it, and it was good for the bones. I
don’t know why I did it, but I told her I was lactose intolerant. We
sort of drifted apart after that, and I have not seen her in an age. I
heard she got married and now runs a beauty parlour that specialises
in putting sparkly fluorescent nail varnish on nails. I wonder if she
paints over the cuticles.
I wear a double wedding band to let people know that I was once
married, but nobody notices any more. When I was married I drank milk
like nobody’s business, and my nails were strong. I grew the nails of
my left hand long so I could finger pick the guitar. I sang songs to
my wife. But these days nobody pays much attention to my hands. Not to
the old fashioned wedding rings, or to the white flecks on my nails,
or my missing cuticles, and I have not sung in a long long time.
Blog photograph copyrighted to the photographer and used with permission by utata.org. All photographs used on utata.org are stored on flickr.com and are obtained via the flickr API. Text is copyrighted to the author, catherinejamieson and is used with permission by utata.org. Please see Show and Share Your Work
