Scars

Years ago I was walking away (I should have been running] from someone toxic. They screamed at me, “Well, you know what you are now? Damaged goods.” I have often heard these words echoing in my head and wondered if that was true. Earlier today, I was singing the lines to the song “Scars”, by Alesso. “I think scars are beautiful.” “I'll be loving these scars for life.” It never occurred to me that any damage, any scars I have acquired over the years could possibly be beautiful. And that a person who so deeply attempt to hurt my soul was actually right; I am damaged. Aren't we all? Things happen to us. Our hearts are broken. We experience huge disappointments, misfortune, failures and mistakes that turn us into damaged goods. Damage leaves scars; scars that until just hours ago i didn't realize have been transforming me into the best version of me that I have met so far. Damage and scars do not equate to being broken unless you allow them to. In 15 days I will be 40. Didn’t my childhood friends literally just threw a surprise party for me in Debbie Krouss’s basement? Just ten years ago a gentle snow starting falling in the city and I was standing on the street (probably smoking a Marlboro Light) in a tube top with jeans. No jacket. Not even a scarf. Because ten years ago I would not be caught dead appropriately layered in NYC while socializing. I feel like it was just 1997 and can't understand how i went from partying my face off to currently “training” for a night out to celebrate my initiation into the next, and from what i have heard, the best decade of life thus far. How the hell did this shit creep up on me? 40. Last week I found a quote that I posted to my Instagram page that said “What screws us up most in life is the picture in our head of how it is supposed to be.” By 40, I was supposed to have been happily married and my children would be finishing middle school or starting high school. Amongst other things, I would teaching not because I had to, but because I wanted to. That’s how it was supposed to be. Here is the reality check. I was divorced but remarried. I had been married for 8 years in April and we had a daughter and a son. After Hurricane Sandy, what was supposed to be our last rental was destroyed and we enjoyed a brief bout of homelessness (and lived with my parents for six weeks). We found a decent place we could afford to rent and swore we would save up to buy a house . Just one year. We were only living there for one year (three years later guess where I am still living…). Two and a half weeks after our 8 year anniversary, my husband passed away, and in seconds I became a widow and a single mother. My son would never know who is father was and my daughter lost her prince. 40. And yet, I have never felt better about myself or life. For years I would obsess and worry over things I could not control or had limited information about. I would brood over the damage I had endured. All of that crap is out the window now. Every choice I have made over the last 39 years has led me to this place and while it has not always been pretty, I realize there are so many wonderful facets to my life. They outweigh the damage. I try to find good in each day and not focus on what is bad. I live through humor. Sometimes my humor is at my own expense or meant to disarm a table filled with people. But humor is what get’s me through. I am diligent about maintaining my mental and physical health. I’m house hunting and excited to make the home I find a real home, not a temporary stay. I feel like I am finally coming into my own and learning who I am. But most importantly, I have a small squad of two who are the very best part of me. Damaged goods sounds terrible, no? Do you know anyone who buys only damaged fruit and dented cans at the supermarket? Doubt it because most people think they want shiny and new. But scars….Scars are the result of damage, and they're supposed to be beautiful? My scars tell a story, as do yours. And if we allow ourselves to embrace them, love them even, then they don’t have to define who we are, but who we want to be.