By Melik
I remember my first very well although some details escape me. I do know I was nervous and scared. And what I remember most was to give it up to trusting that she knew what was best for me. However, once that nurse stuck that damn gun to my arm it went off with a burst of air coupled with a blast of pain. I was enraged. I thought how unfair it was for those two women to tell me everything was going to be alright as if it was going to be all cotton candy and lollipops. I sat silent and wounded. I was vaccinated. With that, I received my first scar.
I would get many more scars as I jumped, biked, ran, and tumbled my way through childhood. A knife wound from trying to whittle wood. Yes, dull knives do hurt. Although I had not yet discovered the significance of having testicles I learned from a bicycle wrecking curb incident that they should be protected at all costs. I saw the advantages of having a ‘girl bike’ but never would have ridden one from embarrassment. As time went on I learned how to better handle these physical scars or even better I learned how to avoid getting them. Those scars were easy. I got hurt. It lasted a while. I had a mark to remind me of the incident. Simple.
Then I discovered a whole new way of getting a scar. It was at a school dance. There were not many people there. I had to beg my mother to let me go. A week’s worth of house work went with it as well. A young woman pulled me on to the dance floor. I had never seen her at the school before. I awkwardly tried to pretend I knew what I was doing as we were solitarily slow dancing on the dance floor. Towards the end of the song she pulled me closer to her and she kissed me. The song ended and so did the kiss. She broke her embrace and disappeared into the darkness as she left me mesmerized on the emptied cafeteria floor. I somehow knew that as good as that felt at that moment it was good to hurt just as much the next day. To this day I still do not know who that kiss was. Although there is no physical evidence, the scar still exists. It does not matter how many times emotional scars happen. Each one hurts more than the first wasp sting. I wonder how I would live my life if I still had that innocence.
I know a couple of young men. They are ten years old. Their father has been in and out of prison all of their young lives. They long for the presence of their father. There is a woman that loves them dearly and tries to singlehandedly play mother, father, confidant and pleasure giver to these two. She expends most of her energy into giving the best that she has and the most that she has to these soon to be men. I try to play a small yet positive role in their lives as well. It is difficult being the new “step-figure” in their lives. It is a delicate balancing act and I gladly accept the challenge in order to show them a positive male figure. I have tried to help enhance their lives with positive experiences. On one such occasion during Lansing Be a Tourist in Your Town, I was spending time with this close trio. I raced remote control cars with them. I took the young ones on a test drive of a Camaro that they enjoyed immensely, enough so that we went for a second run. I could sense their pain when I heard them speak on their father, and they were both certain that if he were here that he would want to come to this event and do exactly what we just did. I knew that would not hold true even if this man was not possibly going away for another prison stint for the fourth time. Their mother confirmed this when I brought up the young boys words when the two of us were alone. I felt pain. I felt their pain. I felt their mother’s pain. Having so many people affectedly negatively by one person over one incident definitely intensified the emotional scar.
I have many scars. I have many emotional scars. I have endured heartache and pain like anyone else. Going through that I would think that if one had children that they would do all that they could to help keep their child free from scars. It would seem to me that a parent would want to do everything within their power to allow their child innocence of emotional scars for as long as humanly possible. To be the one that would inflict these scars on to their own child I cannot understand at all. I would hope that if I were a father, my son or daughter would never have to say things that start with “if my father were here…”
~Melik / me2upro.com
This was printed in the July 4, 2010 – July 17, 2010