Scars

I have three scars on my face. Seeing how I am without a lot of content to write about, I figured I would write about how I got each one of them in chronological order.

Over my left eye - I got this one when I was very young. I couldn't have been more than 7 or 8 years old. I was playing on the outdoors jungle gym outside of a temple (I was raised Jewish). The jungle gym was a layered set of metal rings. These days, outdoor parks and jungle gyms are made a little more kid-safe. In my day, I climbed on high metal rings that were set on fire with gasoline. The only escape being a raised set of razor wire that a brave kid could use to rappel away from the burning heap of ringed metal using ungloved hands. Or at least, that's how I envision it. Anyhow, I lost my grip, falling down the center of the ringed metal contraption and slammed my head over my left eye against the metal frame. It hurt. I got stitches and remember being in wonder of how they more or less used by skin as fabric, sewing together the seam.

On my chin - Again, when I was young, I have a small scar on the left side of my chin when I had a mole removed for plastic surgery. It was a pretty nasty looking mole. One of those moles that hairs grow out of and I couldn't hide or mask it since it was on my FACE. That wasn't the main reason for having the surgery though. I actually was having a pre-cancerous birthmark removed from my chest area. I was conscious the entire time and remember the surreal feeling of my skin being tugged and pulled apart in unnatural ways. The local anaethesia worked, but I could feel the nerves of my skin in the unaffected areas going off as the procedure took place. As an added benefit, when people ask me about the scar on my chest, I can say in a deadpan voice that it was from that mugging/stabbing incident. The look I receive after saying this is usually priceless. It never gets old.

Over my right eye - I seem to have a habit of getting brutally wounded over my eyes, yet not grossly affecting my overall vision. I consider scars to be a ugly, yet charming form of character-building, so this is sort of a win-win. I received this bad boy when apple picking in New York with my family. At the apple orchard, they were giving out these long apple pickers. Essentially, they are polearms that can be used to chop off apples from higher portions of the tree since the lower portion is usually barren due to easy pickings. My mom decided to treat the polearm-like apple picker as an apple picker on my face... by accident of course. She swung it around and slashed the hell out of my eye. I immediately put my hand over my eye in pain as blood started to gush. She immediately when into full-blown panic, thinking she just slashed out my eye. I remember bending back slightly to deflect the blow. Lucky I have quick reflexes!