scar tissue

She wrapped her arms around my arm, rested her head on my shoulder and fell asleep. Speeding down the highway between my two girls, my mind did backflips through time. My thoughts landed on the period of time when I had just become a mother.

I felt sorry for her. Eyes that sparkled born into such a broken home. Infant giggles and innocent happiness that would soon fade away. I knew some of the daggers we threw would miss their target. Some would nick her heart and force her spirit into a dark hiding place.

So I made the choice. The sacrifice was great. I would be absent for half of her breaths. Humid summer afternoons alone. Lonely weekends. Cold Christmas mornings without her excited face to warm my heart. All in hopes that her happiness could be free.

I packed our things and drove away. She screamed hour upon hour as our car weaved through countryside. I had to remind myself she was crying for very practical reasons. And not from the pain of the extremity I had just severed. Or the pressure from the tourniquet I was clumsily attempting to apply.

All this time it seemed he and I had been using love for tug of war. I decided to quit. And with super-human strength, he pulled himself up on the rope. It was so fast and so powerful.

Now there are four of us. Each day when my sleeping girls awake, their happiness is free and unbridled. We are family, spiritually bound. And beneath the new fresh skin is thick, tough, strong scar tissue.