To Touch

Touch is the most powerfull language in the world. Among humans or other animal species, touch is how you really express yourself, towards the other and yourself. To touch is good and healthy. From tenderly embracing your dear friend, to firmely hold with desire the one you love or accuratly punch your provocative rival in the face. To touch is to get closer. To touch is vital!

But touch is also a social tabu. You are not supposed to touch much. Just enough... Which is usually far from what would be a good daily dosage of touching! At work, you shake hands politely, at a considerable distance from the other. At home, you greet mom and dad with a rapid kiss; you might eventually hug your brother or sister once in a while... With your friends you share timid hugs in public. Fortunately, in private, this is often different.

A friend of mine living in the US once told me about this father who was disturbed by the police after a call from his neighbours, suspicious about the man's behaviour with his child. They were rolling and screaming - i.e. playing - in the frontdoor garden!

When I was a little girl, a good slap on my butt would be very clarifying about what I could or could not do. Today, one can constantly watch kids screaming violently at their moms and dads, who scream back to them or simply ignore them.

Another friend, not used to touch among her family, was once completely estatic between my arms, thankfully embrassing her.

My own family gets upset when my friends come to sleep with me, even knowing I praise those warm nights that fill me with the joy of knowing I am not alone

You search for "touch" on Google and you come out with a long list of gadgets...

Touching is still socially repressed, regarded mostly as indecorous or perverse (or a digital tool! go figure...). A portuguese journalist once stated that sex seems to have replaced intimacy, to a point that people even fear the latter and the wonderful explosion of love and fun that the combination of both can be!

And although sex is trivial, when it comes to touching our own bodies things are not that simple. You are not affraid to grow fur on the palm of your hands anymore but you still feel embarrassed about sharing intimacy with yourself. Everybody does it but no one talks about it. And those to who embarrassement has managed to castrate their natural self-love sadly feel insecure about their own bodies.

Not touching is like living away from ourselves... And, therefore, from others.

To touch is a blessing, sometimes a miracle.