My grandmother had a lot of power. Stoic, observant, selective about offering her opinions, she once said that she had aquired a tumor under her tongue from trying to swallow it. Still when she did speak you listened. You didn't have to be encouraged to listen. The quiet power of her voice resonated off something inside us that made it impossible not to believe everything she said without question.
Around puberty I found myself afflicted with seed warts under my nails, across my palms, on my finger tops. I tried everything to remove them. Doctors burned them off, Compound W was applied by the gallon, but in spite of being cut, burned and covered in any number of toxic substances in a vain attempt to remove this bane of my adolescent existence. After several months in complete despair of ever having soft, feminine wart free hands that were capable of gently holding someone else's hand at the skating rink, I was in a state of complete pubescent agony. Grandma quietly spoke up, "Honey, if you want to get rid of those things take this piece of black cotton thread and tie a knot in it for every wart. Bury it, forget it, don't tell a soul, and when the string rots all those nasty things will be gone."
I looked at her a bit disbelieving, careful not to voice my doubt, such disbelief would not do in front of Saint Sadie. I took the length of string, out the back door, carefully counting the warts on my hands as I went, wrapping knots, and thinking of the perfect place to bury my agony. I can't remember spending another day thinking about my warts.
I'm not sure how long it took for them to disappear, or why they never came back. I just know that it worked for me and my brother, and that even though I still do not have the perfect feminine extremity's, (in fact my sons refer to them as Mom's mitts), they have been since the day of Grandma's advice, blemish free.
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