Scars are like tattoos- except with better stories...

I work in a profession where most of us have scars from our work (I fortunately don't have too many, but there's always a story).  I do have a lot of scars from other things though- klutzy things I've done, stories from my past.  Many of the people I work with have tattoos that either hold meaning to the person's current life- or resulted from a whim that is no longer relevant.

Whether it's a human or an animal, I find it fascinating to find out the stories behind scars.  I do think most of them have more in the story and more meaning than a tattoo.  There was the dog that helped save soldiers from an IUD- and got scars in return.  Or dogs who have been hit by bullets, gored by a deer or in one case- snagged on the grill because she was running wildly around a corner.

When I was younger, I never really worried too much about my injuries scarring- I took them as a badge of honor.  The scars I do have on my face, I guess I kind of mind, they don't stick out too much to others, but there are scars from two jaw surgeries and the more pronounced scarring is where I had impetigo when I was just my son's age.  It's kind of interesting that whether it's myself, my dog or my cat, I don't worry too much about scarring.  When it's my 3 1/2 year old, I do.  My dog and cat don't care about their scars, no one will judge them by them (although my husband might debate me about the temporary tattoo I once put on my dog, but that's another story).

I guess this just kind of goes along with how while I know life's not perfect and stuff happens, the Mom in me wants to protect my kid from anything I can.  My son loves to run when he's on his walks and we just got knee pads and elbow pads from Amazon for the new scooter he's going to be getting for his birthday.  For a brief moment, I thought, "maybe he should wear his knee pads and elbow pads when he walks with us because he always seems to trip."  Then I realized the ridiculousness of it.  I remembered how I can't protect him from everything and he is eventually going to have scars- physical and otherwise.  The best thing I can do is teach him to embrace them, to grow from them and try to at least have good stories to go with them.