My Best Scar Story

This post came from a prompt over at  YA Highway...last Wednesday. I am late, okay very late but I couldn't resist posting my best scar story, even if it's overdue. Why? Because I think scars are fascinating. Like Little Bee says in the book of the same name by Chris Cleave, "We must see all scars as beauty. Okay? This will be our secret. Because take it from me, a scar does not form on the dying. A scar means, I survived."

This is not necessarily a story of survival, rather it is a story of childish stupidity and a good reason not to have desserts for breakfast.

At the ripe age of seven I was an early riser. At least, as far as the rest of my family was concerned. My little sister wouldn't wake up until after my grandmother dressed her sleeping form and brushed her hair. I always suspected her sleep coma was an act but never got proof. On the other hand, I was up, dressed, and ready to go an hour before the school bus would arrive. This gave me time to read The Babysister's Club and Anne of Green Gables. 

It was common for me to prepare my own breakfast, this usually consisted of boxed cereal and milk. Nothing complex or dangerous. One morning, however, I had a craving. Summer was in the air and when I dressed in lime green shorts and a splattered paint bodysuit (complete with snaps, I was a fashionista from day one.) I had a hankering for an ice cream sundae.



Me, aged 7.

 Everyone was still asleep and I knew they wouldn't approve of my breakfast choice so I quietly went about with the preparations. I used a chair from the dining room to get into the freezer. Mint chocolate chip, I believe it was the white kind. Oh glorious breakfast!

To top off my ice cream I grabbed the glass container of Smucker's Fudge from the fridge. Now here is where I made my first mistake. I put the fudge in the microwave for a minute and waited patiently, counting to 60 along with the microwave timer. I  questioned why the microwave cooked for 60 seconds whether I hit 6-0 or 1-0-0. What if I wanted it to cook for 100 seconds. I figured most people didn't think about seconds like that. At no point, in that pensive minute, did I question my actions.

Today, I know you don't need to heat up fudge for that long, 15-20 seconds would suffice. Also I know you should remove the lid, something I overlooked. When the microwave beeped I rushed to open it and remove the fudge lest anyone should hear. I did what my mom and grandmother always did, I grabbed the fudge with my bare hand, it was so hot I stifled a gasp but I didn't let go until I had already pulled it out of the microwave.



Dangerously delicious


To this day, I swear the container exploded before it hit the tile floor. There was a crash and scalding hot fudge spewed into the air, like a chocolate volcano erupting. A plume of fudge connected with the inner thigh of my right leg. It burned. I screamed and cried and tried to rub it off but it hurt to do anything to it and the fudge was still hot. My mother came running in and I can only imagine the obscenities that tore through her mind at the sight of me in my bright green shorts dancing around crying. Fudge was all over me, the floor, the cabinets. The mint chocolate chip was melting on the counter top. All before she had her morning coffee. I can't remember if I was yelled at or the details of the fudge being wiped from my leg but I was taken to the hospital, where they wrapped my injury in soft white gauze and covered it in silvadene cream.

I had minor burns on my hand but my leg had a second degree burn. To me it didn't look like a burn, it looked like a giant blister. A blister that took up my whole inner thigh. My mom said if I had worn pants it wouldn't have been so bad, but the fudge connected with my bare skin. I remember when the blister popped, I woke up and thought I had wet the bed and didn't want to tell anyone. I am left with a a scar that resembles, in my opinion, the big dipper. As I acquired the scar while preparing ice cream, the humor of this is not lost on me.

To this day whenever I have Smucker's products (more frequently than I should) I use oven mitts to remove them from the microwave.