palm to palm is holy palmers' kiss

I was sitting in church a few weeks ago with a group of my teenage girls when I noticed something interesting. Every time we would pray, they would hold each other's hands. Even mine!

I tried thinking back to when I was in high school. I definitely remember standing next to the person I liked and puposefully holding hands during the prayer, but I don't have any knowledge of doing it during every prayer even when I was standing next to a bunch of girls. Though I wouldn't put it past my close knit high school friends and I.

A few days later, I was talking to Carly after babysitting Shiloh and we got into the topic of holding hands. Like with a boy. Romantically. I started thinking about it and I can count on one hand the amount of boys that I've held hands with romantically. I can remember very specifically the first boy I held hands with.

We were in 6th grade and "going out" and his friend told me that he (the "boyfriend") wanted to hold hands with me. I flipped out. I was terrified of any sort of physical-ness. Eventually I gave in and we held hands from our lockers all the way to the music hall where he dropped me off at the choir room with a short hug (Eeeek!) and then went on his merry way to the band hall. The worst thing about it was that our friends pretty much danced around us the entire time and made a huge deal about it. Seriously one of the most uncomfortable things I've ever done. But so sweet and thrilling at the same time!

After him it wasn't until my sophomore year of high school (I believe) and it was a thousand times less awkward and there were sound effects involoved.

There have only been a couple after that; one that I'd really prefer not to remember (which means I shouldn't have held hands with him, or kissed him for that matter, but I was young and stupid, what can you do?) and one that was just sweet.

I think that in our enlightened society we forget how important and special small physical things can be. We're in a rush to get to the next step. To get to the kissing, the making out, the etc and etc until it leads to the really intimate stuff. I found this great article about hand holding HERE. I love how she describes the simple act of palm to palm as "dynamite" because that's always how I've felt about holding hands.

I don't want to forget the people I've held hands with. I don't want to forget the people I've kissed. I want it to remain as special as it's meant to be. I want to call my best friend and explain ecstatically in detail how he intertwined his fingers with mine.