The sad-looking little girl in this Friday's photo was me, about 66 or 67 years ago. I went looking for this picture earlier in the week when I discovered that the burn scar on my leg has become visible again after many, many years in which I neither noticed nor remembered it.
I got the burn by falling on a hot floor register. The rectangular pattern of the scar stretched out and became fainter as I grew, and by the time I reached middle-age, it took a practiced eye to find any trace of it. What's different this year is that I've acquired a rare suntan during those early morning breakfasts outside, and that little bit of color was all it took to make the scar pop out again.
The reappearance of the scar seemed metaphorical to me: I think all of us have a few scars, possibly physical but more likely spiritual, that lie dormant and hidden until some combination of conditions raises them to the surface again. The good news is that age gives us perspective. We may find, when an old scar resurfaces, that the pain that caused it in the first place no longer holds us in its grip.
I think of my scars as a map of my life-I can point to them all and tell you how I got them.
ReplyDeletePoor little you, do you remember it? It must have hurt like heck.
Janet, I don't remember it at all.
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