Scars

 

Lately I’ve been caught up in thought about a lot of things. The present and the past. It’s a norm for me to reflect on my past to asses where I am in the present to make sure I’m staying on track with my goals or perhaps to just see if I can recognize what choices led me to where I am so I can continue to make them or course correct for the future. I find myself doing this a lot more during the new year every year as I think most people do. Its an easy checkpoint to look at the previous year and make resolutions for the next.

 

For me often enough it happens more this this of year because of past experiences that felt like a new start. One of the things that has helped my memory has been breaking up my life in various grouped experiences or sections of time then placing memories into those little chapters making them easy to recall when I think about those times. I’ve stopped doing it as much in recent  years, mostly for a lack of defined moments when things sort of blur together, but when possible I do. Seeing that I’m closer to 40 now my memory isn’t what it used to me and recalling everything as clearly as I used to isn’t as easy. Its probably a sign that I don’t do it as much anymore so much like a muscle, not recalling these memories makes them fade a little.

 

Anyway, for the longest time I divided my life into various chapters so to speak somewhat like this:

 

Childhood up until my parents divorce

High School

Early college/pre Mexico 2002-2003

Mexico 2003-2005

Post Mexico 2005-2006

BYUI 2006

T3 Years/UCA/Target 2007-2008

Return To Idaho 2009-2010

Post Breakup/Moving On 2010-2014

Marriage 2014-Present

 

The last couple probably could be divided better, but it all sort of mushes together. Sometimes these chapters I divide in my head based on time, others major events, or just periods of work. Point is, early Jan/Feb/March was a big change for me for a few of these events. When I was fed up with school in late 06 and decided to move back home, I spent the first few months of 2007 starting over. When I was determined to finish school and graduate and went back to Idaho in 2009 the first few months were me starting over once again. Then at the end of 2010/early 2011 I had to make a 3^rd fresh start and figure myself out one more time.   So to say I get nostalgic in the 1^st quarter of the year is an understatement. Nearly every one of these chapters was born around the same time and usually from sort of traumatic or at least sad catalyst. Or at least kick started by one. So springtime usually feels like a feeling of rebirth for me.

 

2007 I learned to break the mold of my pre-determined life plan by I had thought up years early by dropping out of college.

2008 I learned to depend on myself and express myself for who I am

2009 I learned how to study and knuckle down to achieve my goals and started a deep relationship that defined my life for the next few years.

2010 I learned more about myself and at least the beginnings of what it means to put someone else first in a relationship and your needs secondary, at least sort of. It’s a trait I’m still working on to this day,

2011 I learned to be ok with being alone and figure myself out again while starting something new.

 

And so on and so on.

 

So what really kickstarted this was thinking about my face while thinking about this time of year. This is the same face I’ve had during all those events, but the landscape has changed and scars have taken the place of smoother textures. Both physical and internal I suppose. I think I’m just mushing up two different things here now, but I don’t care. I don’t think anyone reads this blog anymore or remembers it exists. Hell, I forgot it exists up until recently. So I feel it’s a safe place for me to just type streams of consciousness into the void for nobody to hear and that’s ok.

 When I look in the mirror I often turn my attention to my right eye. More specifically around my right eye. I still have two deep scars from where I got part of my face torn open and had to basically have mini plastic surgery to fix it years ago. I still don’t completely have feeling back in my eyebrow and its been a long time. Yet when I look at it, I remember the story behind it and the feelings and emotions around that day that accompanied the events that caused the scar. I hope it never goes away because it’s a good reminder me for various important things. I have a few scars like this on my body that I feel the same way about. My left hand has one from when I was a kid and fell down on the playground, my leg has one from when I got bit by a dog while walking my dog a few years ago. Various burn marks on my hands from working in bakeries.  I used to have more but I’ve noticed that they’ve begun to fade or disappeared altogether.

 I used to have one on my left inner arm where I scratched it helping my mom move something in the garage in late2010. For some reason while I looked at it, it reminded me of my then predicament and I decided to use it as a visual reminder for what I was going through and kept pulling on it every few days to not let it heal until it would leave a bigger scar. It’s all but gone now, but I can still see remnants of where it was and while it’s probably a good thing, it still makes me sad to see it go. Despite what it represented I feel like that scar just internalized and is still there even if I can’t see it, but I’m still working on it but that’s a story for another day.

 

Healing takes time for both the physical and mental and the scars I’ve still got both physically and mentally are here to stay and to remind me of where I’ve been and what direction to go in the future.