Scars: Part 2

Just a few days ago Sir Bowie treated us with a very good blog about scars. It was a timely article because yesterday I had the privilege to adorn my battle scared body with yet another scar. This one will be yet another one on my face due to the removal of Basil Cell Cancer. My face has many scars, which over time have modeled themselves into Sir Hook. My first scars on my face where from Cystic Acne. My second set where from a motorcycle wreck during high school, where I had to have skin graphs and large chunks of gravel plucked from my face. The third set came from the removal of a benign tumor on my neck.


I was refereed to a specialist across the river in Owensboro, Kentucky. Owensboro is famous for its share of high profile NASCAR drivers like Darryl Waltrip, so when I saw the Craftsmen mechanics tool box in the surgery room I knew that I was in the right place! My father, after his baseball days, eventually became a car dealer. Later on he sold his business and enjoyed the life of a shop foreman. As long as I can remember I have associated my dad with baseball, cars, mechanics and Craftsman tool boxes. Later in life I associated him with hospital rooms and surgery suites as he battled lung cancer.

At first they thought that they would have to shave off my entire mustache. That would have been very strange because I haven't shaved my mustache off since 1983. Lady Allwinky and my children, as well of the majority of my closest friends, have never seen me with a naked lip. Fortunately, they only shaved off the lower portion of the stache and marked the area where they would start digging for gold.

Here I am in the car afterwards with the bandage that is my constant companion for the next 3 days. I told the surgeon that I felt like "Harvey Dent", famous as "2 Face" from the Batman series. By the way, if you haven't seen the Dark Night yet, it is a must! Anyway lying beneath my bandage will be my newest addition to my collection of scars. I can't wait to see it! Not to repeat myself; however I will, I am going to close this blog out with a comment I posted on Sir Bowie's Scar blog:

Scars aren't always a sign of stupidity, though my body bears some of those, but scars show the fragility of life and a sign that you have been given the opportunity to continue to live it. With my open heart scar and now my back surgery scar exactly across from each other like the North and South Pole of my body, I joke that for Halloween I need to find a sword that I can attach the hilt to my back and the blade coming out of my chest because it looks like I've been run through. The truth is, I have, but I live to tell the tale and share the experience that is the beauty of living and dying in a new state of grace. Perhaps I am too simple for some in my profession of faith in a Savior who bore his scares for me, but I do believe, and now have first hand knowledge, that by your wounds you are healed!

Sir Hook the Scar Bearer of Warrick