Hand Job – by Juneau

Adam sang beautifully this morning on The Early Show. He was back to his pitch-perfect, tastefully sexy self, radiating charm and joie de vivre. He was svelte and stunning in a tailored black jacket and a very cool shirt with a space-agey high-standing collar that looked like it leapt off a Japanese designer’s scribbling pad, worn over tight, gleaming black pants. And now, can we put the whole AMA tempest behind us and get back to having us some fun?

I’ve been ruminating about the mysterious allure of fingerless gloves. They have long been part of the accoutrements of rockers, as well as of courtesans, hookers, bikers and others on the glittery fringes of society. A sartorial cliché, but on Adam they transform into a second skin that feels so right, just like his darkened hair and eyeliner.

There is something irresistibly sexy about fingerless gloves. We find fingerless gloves and their sibling gauntlets across centuries and civilizations. The knights of the European Middle Ages sported gauntlets of chain mail, while the ladies of the court favored velvet sleeves that extended to cover the backs of their pale hands. Half a world away, the Japanese samurai and aristocratic ladies donned gauntlets of leather elegantly plated with glossy lacquer that transformed the back of the hand into a dark pool of infinite mystery. In V’Adoro Pupille, Kiri Te Kanawa, resplendent in a dark sorceress’s gown festooned with golden serpents, sports black jeweled gauntlets, as do the writhing dancers and the stunning Adonis. And since we have been discoursing on our love of the automobile, there is the driving glove – again fingerless.

Digit-free gloves and gauntlets are of course practical, protecting precious hands from the cruel bite of a sword blade or from the bitter wind and rain, while leaving the fingers free to do their work. But what makes this minuscule accessory so deliciously sexy? They enhance the allure of the fingers protruding from beneath the covering of leather, chain mail, velvet or spandex. Dark colors are preferred, for contrast and drama. The simple act of covering the back of the hand – concealing knotty sinews, veins and knuckles – transforms the fingers into something immeasurably delicate, vulnerable. Full gloves exude a kind of prim sensuality – picture those shoulder-length satin gloves on Audrey Hepburn or Barbra Streisand – but slice off the fingers, let the digits escape, and the glove becomes elegantly obscene.

A fingerless glove is the manual counterpart of a corset. Sexuality bound, controlled, tied down in order to be set free… They evoke the dominance-submission game. (Is this so obvious as to be pointless to write about? Oh well…it’s something I had never given thought to before, so I just have to get this out of my head.) The hands are the ultimate erogenous organ, which we tend to overlook in the everyday realm because our hands are our drudges: making beds, grasping the toothbrush, washing the dishes, picking up the trash, scooping kitty litter, scrubbing up messes, counting money, and keyboarding – okay, this last task can be quite erotic as we here know.

But the hand is also the mistress of pleasure. It plays the body as an instrument, eliciting a symphony of sensory experiences: delight, ecstasy, pain. Under its sensitive caress or kneading touch, the fingers are able to awaken nerve impulses that otherwise would have lain dormant. That caress can be languid and gentle, or it can stroke and vibrate faster than the eye can see, fluttering over nerve endings to arouse sensations beyond the normal realm, the way a violinist’s vibrato – or singer’s — can make the ether pulsate.

I considered presenting a pair of gloves as a gift to Adam, but I could not find any online that satisfied what I envisioned for him. Someday, I may have a pair designed and custom-made for him. I would seek out velvety soft, supple kidskin, rubbed to a dark metallic gloss with just a hint of iridescent blue, exquisitely tailored and crafted, studded with steel across the knuckles, tracing a dreamy design…

Juneau writes about neuroscience, physics and whatever else attracts her peripatetic attention. She is co-author with Xena of On the Meaning of Adam Lambert, and co-hostess of this Salon.