May I Wash Your Feet?

This week I read a blog post by a friend of mine who is a nurse. She wrote about foot-washing and other foot care for the elderly as an aspect of caregiving. Reading her words reminded me of the foot-washing practice our church observes following Communion in a service we hold semi-annually.

And then it hit me – we likely won’t be having Communion and Foot-washing this spring. At least, “not in the normal way”. (which is becoming a very normal COVID-19 add-on to plans and clarifier to statements these days)

Quite possibly, this season I won’t be able to take part in foot-washing – that tangible act we do, symbolizing humility and servanthood to our sisters in Christ. I won’t be able to kneel down and physically touch my sister’s feet, or to rise and embrace her after she has washed mine. And this at a time when we are perhaps more than ever longing to be in person with people we love. Social distancing is also touch distancing us.

Sister, I don’t want to grow out of touch with you. May I wash your feet here?

I am kneeling, in a bowed down position to serve you. You, seated on a chair facing me, offer me your foot by lifting it just above the basin of water that is between us.

Did I see you hesitate a bit? Maybe your feet are ticklish. Maybe your feet are bigger than everyone else's and the embarrassment of having someone else see them up close almost kept you from joining the line of foot-washers. Maybe it just plain makes you squirmy inside to think of allowing another to handle a low-ly part of you, your sole.

But you offer me your foot anyway. I reach for it, and cradle it in my left hand while using my right hand to dip down into the water. I hope that the church trustees, when they readied the basin, have made the water not too warm and not too cool for your foot’s comfort. I cup some water in my right hand and bring it up to the top of your foot. I gently release the water through my fingers and it runs down over your foot and back into the basin.

I notice your foot shape is different than mine. Your toes sort of curve in over each other while there are significant gaps between mine. I recognize the signs of wear, though, in several places, and there at the edge of yours, I see a blister. Looks like you’ve been on a hard road these past weeks. Or is it months, now? I notice a scar on top of your foot. Maybe you’ve had surgery in that spot, or maybe it’s a rather knobby line of skin that’s grown over an injury you sustained there long ago.

Perhaps we would talk a long time about these things if we stayed like this, you holding the stillness and me holding your sole. But the last of the water slides off your foot into the basin and I let go. My hands reach for the towel I’ve laid at my waist. Both hands outstretched under the towel, I cup the cloth for you at the side of the basin.

You place your dripping foot on my toweled hands and I begin to wipe it dry. Pardon my awkwardness, I think, as I try to dry every inch, from the back of your heel to your tips of toes, and between.

You rest your newly washed and dried foot on the floor and we both sort of swing back to the basin as I prepare to wash your other foot. I repeat the bowing, the bending, the leaning, the cradling, the dipping, the releasing, the gently rubbing dry.

Then we trade places. Now I’m the one seated and you are facing me, stooped low and towel-girded. I feel bad that my feet are the ones you ended up having to wash. I reluctantly offer them to you as they are, bare and veiny. I hope you don’t see the brown cracks in my heels where I tried to scrub the earth marks out but they wouldn’t erase.

But you seem to overlook the ugliness – an ingrown toenail that I tried to repair myself, that weird bony bump close to my big toe, the calluses ridging up thickly along the edges of my feet. I pray they don’t also smell of sweaty shoes.

You reach out and receive my feet, these losers at beauty, and draw them toward the water with your servant hands. I watch the liquid from your cupped hand spill over my skin and fall back into the basin. You graciously dip up another handful for good measure.

Then you, too, reach out to wipe my damp and glistening feet in the unfolding of your towel. You are careful to absorb every drip of water with a methodical but gentle rubbing of my feet with the white terrycloth.

You finish drying my feet and you wipe your hands on the same towel you have used on my feet. You stand at the same time I rise from sitting. Facing each other, we draw close and give each other a quick embrace.

You whisper in my ear that my servanthood in daily life inspires you. I find myself protesting inwardly. Stop! If you had heard me snap at my husband and yell at my children this morning as we rushed to get out the door. If you would know how I envy you your confidence in a crowd. If you would see me grimace with impatience when the neighbor lady phones me for the third time in a day. If… you wouldn’t say those words!

But you have said them, and you seem to mean them. I lean forward and give you a quick little extra squeeze. “I’m so glad you’re a sister in my family,” I say.

And I really mean it.