When I was a child, my brother and I built a fort out of some old corrugated sheet metal we found and a few pieces of scrap wood. While building it, the metal cut my leg deep enough that we saw bone. Since my parents weren’t big believers in doctors, I have a nice scar on my leg.
When I was a bit older I was walking around the zoo after hours ( I grew up in the zoo- book about that on the way) and found an abandoned stroller. My brother was with me and I decided to sit in the stroller and he pushed me. That didn’t last long before we crashed and I fell out. My knee landed on a rock and once again, I was bleeding. And once again I ended up with a scar.
After I was married and Jon was a toddler, my husband went out of town and I was invited to a party with some old friends I hadn’t seen in years. They were bringing their kids and they said Jon was welcome, so I went.
Pretty quickly I realized we had all grown in different directions and I was ready to go. I made my excuses, gathered my child up and we were out of there.
While we were leaving down the steep drive way, I fell. I brushed it off, hoped no one inside had seen, and got Jon in his car seat. I drove home quickly and once Jon was in bed, I looked and realized my leg was drenched in blood. Once I cleaned myself up, I realized I had a deep cut on my leg. With Tim gone and my baby asleep in the next room I knew that once again I had to just hope for the best and would have a scar.
I can give you a tour of all of these incidents by the marks on my legs. I don’t dislike them, they are the visible marks of the stories of my life. For the most part they do not bother me at all.
Lately I have realized that the scars on the inside, the marks left on your psyche, are much harder to deal with than the scars on your skin.
I guess it is easier to hide those internal scars, but they seem to hurt much longer and mark deeper than the the external one.
Right now I am off the grid, alone in an undisclosed location(how’s that for sounding mysterious!) trying to heal some internal scars. It is not an easy process. There are no stitches, no medicine, no recipe to make the internal scars better.
I am flying blind during this process, not sure how to proceed. But I am doing my best to heal and move on. The view of the white sand and ocean waves always helps. Oops, almost told you where I am!
