Holding Hands

I have been married for fifty-two years.  During all this time, I have been as mystified about - as I have been grateful for - the power of love.   It is something I cannot define, though I certainly know it when I feel it.  The simplest expression of that love, for me, has been holding hands.  Before we ever kissed, we held hands.  As we age, we still hold hands.  It feels just as good now as it did the very first time. 

Holding hands is not the sole province of lovers.  We held our children's and grandchildren's , hands.  They still grasped ours, at least for a while, even when they became independent young children.  We smile when we see young people holding hands.  We see people holding hands to demonstrate their solidarity, when confronted by grief, in prayer and in protest.  

We enter the world alone, in the first of life's separations, and we hold the hands of those  leaving life so that death is not such a lonely parting.  Our lives in between are a search for connection.  Holding hands unites us. The feeling of touching another person lends comfort and reassurance against the emptiness of a dangerous world.  It offers the sign of friendship and caring and invites them in return, for we are social beings who will either end up in cooperation or conflict. 

But these are logical explanations for behavior that occurs almost always without thinking. When I grabbed my future wife's hand for the first time, it was an emotional act, for which I only later added a reason.  It was born of the heart not the head. 

We need to touch others in our lives - physically. When I touch the hand of someone I love and care about, it is a way of showing that love.  But it does more - even among those who are neither lovers nor even friends.  Scientific studies reveal that touching another lowers stress and produces oxytocin,  the "love" chemical that forges bonds of trust and caring.  It can also reduce pain through the release of serotonin.

The Internet and all the virtual connections among us cannot replace this.  Indeed, we should wonder if the online and social media worlds we increasingly inhabit work against the need for physical connection.  In their best uses, they can lead to that, but that's not inevitable.    

The Greeks articulated three kinds of love.  Eros, romantic attachment, is what we think of as "being in love."  Philia is the love between friends.  Agape is the love we feel for others just because they are human beings, even if we don't know them.  Holding hands is an expression of and forges all three kinds of love.  A good society and a safe world, one in which people are cared for and cared about, needs all three.

As we witness the world, especially as revealed in daily media, it is easy to become distrusting, cynical, and devoid of hope.  Instead of reaching out, we pull in, searching for the safety of a personal cocoon.  But the only real safety is in love not isolation.  When we are born, the first instinct is to grab the finger of the hand that holds us.  That act is a metaphor for how we need to live our lives.  So, as I walk down the street and instinctively reach for my wife's hand, I am grateful that life has given me the opportunity to do that.  We need more holding hands in this world.

Photo Credit: RichardBH