I have scars all over my body.
Several summers ago, after attending a family reunion in the tiny grain-fueled town of Trochu, Alberta, I found myself visiting family friends at a cabin alongside Christina Lake. Earlier on this trip I had managed to dive into a pool that was much more shallow than I had anticipated, hitting my jaw and left shoulder hard against the grainy cement bottom. It scabbed over, and if you look hard enough today, you can still see the scars.
On this particular morning, I had been dared to try wakeboarding. Not being one to turn down a dare even if my balance is pathetic at the best of times (and morning never really is the "best of times" for me), I rose to the challenge. Around the same time, my father suggested a race to get in the water first, to which I gleefully accepted and began to run. The dock was wet and I slipped at the very end of it, landing knee-first on its hard wooden edge.. I fell the only way I could- forward- and was surprised that it wasn't bleeding at all. Just hard, cold pain. The cut was deep but it seemed silly to go get stitches, since the knee moves around so much. You can still see the scar.
When I was sixteen, I went to Mexico with my family. After days of mad bus rides, adventures with my father along the coast, and delicious yogurt, we ended up in a place I cannot recall the name of. It was on the inside of a bay that was rumoured to be protected from sharks by dolphins at the mouth. I had the best meal of the entire trip there, on a dusty street lined by small stores. Night was falling and my shins were badly sunburnt.
I watched the sun sink into the ocean for the first time in my life from that town. There were no landmasses in the way. I was deeply in love with my surroundings.
Earlier in the day I had been swimming, and I stepped down on something that either bit or lashed out at my foot. I remember screaming and kicking and swimming as fast as I could manage to shore, convinced that whatever it was that had attacked me (or defended itself from me) was still latched on to my right foot. I never did get it looked at, and I'm still alive today. There are two small, pale purple marks on my skin, but they are blending together with time. Fading into one another. You can still see the scar.
My heart becomes more scratched up and used with every passing year. You will never truly see those scars, and I don't think I'd want you to. Some things are best left untouched and alone. [Sometimes I believe that my only real hindrance is memory. It prevents me from turning into pure, unadulterated light. I am the Mnemosyne of your dreams.]
Thursdays are so incredibly lonely.
Where are your scars?
Several summers ago, after attending a family reunion in the tiny grain-fueled town of Trochu, Alberta, I found myself visiting family friends at a cabin alongside Christina Lake. Earlier on this trip I had managed to dive into a pool that was much more shallow than I had anticipated, hitting my jaw and left shoulder hard against the grainy cement bottom. It scabbed over, and if you look hard enough today, you can still see the scars.
On this particular morning, I had been dared to try wakeboarding. Not being one to turn down a dare even if my balance is pathetic at the best of times (and morning never really is the "best of times" for me), I rose to the challenge. Around the same time, my father suggested a race to get in the water first, to which I gleefully accepted and began to run. The dock was wet and I slipped at the very end of it, landing knee-first on its hard wooden edge.. I fell the only way I could- forward- and was surprised that it wasn't bleeding at all. Just hard, cold pain. The cut was deep but it seemed silly to go get stitches, since the knee moves around so much. You can still see the scar.
When I was sixteen, I went to Mexico with my family. After days of mad bus rides, adventures with my father along the coast, and delicious yogurt, we ended up in a place I cannot recall the name of. It was on the inside of a bay that was rumoured to be protected from sharks by dolphins at the mouth. I had the best meal of the entire trip there, on a dusty street lined by small stores. Night was falling and my shins were badly sunburnt.
I watched the sun sink into the ocean for the first time in my life from that town. There were no landmasses in the way. I was deeply in love with my surroundings.
Earlier in the day I had been swimming, and I stepped down on something that either bit or lashed out at my foot. I remember screaming and kicking and swimming as fast as I could manage to shore, convinced that whatever it was that had attacked me (or defended itself from me) was still latched on to my right foot. I never did get it looked at, and I'm still alive today. There are two small, pale purple marks on my skin, but they are blending together with time. Fading into one another. You can still see the scar.
My heart becomes more scratched up and used with every passing year. You will never truly see those scars, and I don't think I'd want you to. Some things are best left untouched and alone. [Sometimes I believe that my only real hindrance is memory. It prevents me from turning into pure, unadulterated light. I am the Mnemosyne of your dreams.]
Thursdays are so incredibly lonely.
Where are your scars?
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i have a purple scar on my left knee that sticks out in a nearly fluorescent manner when it's cold outside. i got it back home in calgary last winter. i was flailing wildly down the street when i hit a patch of ice and wound up flailing directly into a patch of gravel and taking all the skin off.
it was pretty awesome.