that this horrible disease on my hands was connect-
ed to the pain and trauma I was experiencing in my
daily life and my relationship with my father. That
felt like an impossible obstacle. How could that sim-
ply get cleared up? So my hands were never going to
be healed.
Then the other pastor said, “I feel like there’s
this huge hole in your heart where a father’s love
should be.” Then I lost it, I didn’t care if I was being
appropriate or not, I leapt out of my chair and into
his big, strong arms and sobbed my heart out on his
shoulder, long, hard and loud sobs that filled the
old middle school gym with resounding heartache.
A broken heart, a bleeding, blistering, scaly, red and
angry heart. I left a large, wet stain on his plaid lum-
berjack shirt.
~~~
After another week, I quit. It’s taken me that
long to realize. It’s no accident that this is how my
body has decided to tell me to stop. The day before
we are supposed to start trimming weed, on Novem-
ber 1st, 2017, I get a call from my sister Rachel that
my dad is dead. I fly out from Medford, OR the next
day to be with my family for the week. I barely cry.
When I get back, I trim for two weeks, feeling noth-
ing. But my body knows. It’s where the grief comes
screaming out of me, begging me to get the fuck out
of Southern Oregon. “What the fuck is wrong with
you? Don’t you see? You can’t grieve here, in a white-
walled, windowless room of concrete floors and
florescent lighting. You need your friends. You need
72
Seattle and the comfort of those who love you.” On
Thanksgiving Day—my father’s favorite holiday—I
flee into the arms of my best friend.
When I go to the doctor, she only gives me
a stronger steroid cream. I am surprised and angry.
Why doesn’t she just give me prednisone and be
done with it? How much difference can there be be-
tween an over-the-counter steroid cream of 0.01%
and the prescription strength of 0.05%?
~~~
Five days later, the last blisters have gone
and parts of my skin have hardened like leather into
yellow crusts or dark red medallions on my fingers.
My hands don’t itch anymore. New skin has formed
underneath the yellow, thick scales and it’s a beau-
tiful, strange purple, showing the blood under-
neath the fleshy part of my palms. I guess there is
a big difference between 0.01% and 0.05% after all.
I have the urge to rip off the scaly pieces, as if they
are only layers of dried glue that have formed on my
hands, begging to be peeled off. But I know that if
I do, it will tear into the tender flesh at the edges.
In between my fingers, the loose pieces of skin flick
and flap against each other like bits of dried paper
stuck to my hands. I carefully trim the excess with
nail clippers, trying not to eat into the tender, new,
purple skin underneath with the teeth of the metal.
My palms are scaled over in a thick, crusty skin pock-
marked in dark red and yellow where the pools of
blisters have now dried up. It will take its time. I must
wait to shed this old skin.