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Mitchell Landrie, author of the new memoir My Years at the Wharf, will not stop writing about how old his mother’s hands look.
“The brush of my mother’s frail and ancient hand in the thicket of my hair reminded me what’s important,” writes Landrie in his memoir, in one of many images meant to convey the passage of time but mostly just rip on his mother’s hands. “When I was young, my mother’s hands were soft yet strong, just like she was. In her later years, her hands are shaky and liver-spotted. Her papery skin bunches as she strokes my hair, weaker, but more loving, more resolute.”
Sources close to Landrie’s family report that, upon reading My Years at the Wharf, Landrie’s mom, Medora, felt really self-conscious about her hands. She now wears gloves when around her son.
“I return home to see my mom making chicken soup, her weathered hands cradling stalks of celery,” writes Landrie, shoehorning in another yet observation about his mother’s hands. “Though her hands have been worn by time, they are held together by force of character. Lovingly, she hands me a bowl of soup with her decrepit hands, old and bony, but hers.”
Sources also note that in My Years at the Wharf, Landrie greatly exaggerates how many girlfriends he has had.
