The Scar

We all have scars.

Some are physical. Some are emotional.

They come in all shapes and sizes. A number of scars we don’t even notice or recall when or how they came to be. Other scars we pride ourselves on surviving, rather it be from a paper cut or really bad breakup, while certain scars…

Certain scars go under rug swept and are rarely spoken about. They are the most risky. Sometimes they haven’t even healed, or are just too delicate to touch. These scars are the engineer’s of personal barricades; the assassin of any sort of relationship; the pollution of well-being.

They are that which we cannot let go.

Despite my Scar, you stick with me. Maybe because you were here when it happened, when the world spun out of control and everything, it felt, went to ruins. You were a quiet comfort to the deafening chalk mask, and resilient to the false rumors swimming around me.

“This too shall pass,” you said, and kept a steady hand to my shoulder.

Even our scrap (a few years later) didn’t lessen your loyalty regarding this wicked Scar. (You have always been more forgiving, another example in which I do well to remember.) And whenever the Scar breaks surface and badgers me, you help me reason it through, laugh it out because that’s what best friends do.

You knew before I did that I’d survive.

You knew I’d come to see the Scar, not as a dictator, but a maker of personality and a burner of dross.

It has shaped me. It continues to shape me.

It reminds me that the person I was is not the person I am.

And I am grateful for the Scar.