Scrape

I hate that scene in Anne of Avonlea, when she goes out to the milking pen, sees her cow still in it, and realizes that she has sold Rachael's cow to Mr. Blithe by mistake.
I hate it, because I know the feeling.

There is nothing I loathe more than being in a scrape.
Loathe it.
Absolutely L-O-A-T-H-E

I detest being embarrassed, and trying to save face, and trying not to cry in public...
I am not the "brush it off" type of girl. It will not be brushed. Believe me, I have tried. It will not be brushed.

Every time I feel that, "I want to crawl under a rock and die" feeling... I keep feeling that feeling. (I started typing that sentence with the hope of it ending profoundly... no such. Alas!)

I had that feeling today, and I suspect I'm not the only one who has ever felt this way.

As I pondered about it tonight, I thought...

THESE ARE THE MOMENTS IN LIFE THAT I CANNOT STAND.

A friend, upon trying to help me feel better, said,

"I have a saying, Katie. A saying for when I think life is super difficult or things look grim. I think to myself, 'At least I'm not being chased by mastodons'. And, next time you're in this situation, think of your ancestors who were being trampled by mastodons everyday... [problems like this are] not so life ruining then."

He had a point. I won't argue with him.
But what is it about being trampled by mastodons that always seems appealing in "Crawl under a rock and die" moments?

There is something about the little things that hurts the worst.

My dear friend Joanna Newsom, in her song "Only Skin" probably puts it best. The song is 16 minutes long, but right in the middle, the music boils down for a moment, and she sings,

"Scrape your knee: it is only skin."

Now, I recently scraped my knees (funny story about that, ask me sometime) and it hurt. Bad. That's the thing about scrapes. They hurt like the devil. Maybe it's just a myth, but I've heard that many times when someone is stabbed (especially when they don't see the knife) they have no idea they have been stabbed. 30% of stab wound victims die. I am guessing 0% of knee-scrape victims die, though I think you'd be hard-pressed to find a knee-scrape victim who wasn't fully aware that their knee was scraped.

It's as though human beings are equipped to deal with the hefty things (shock, for example, probably plays a huge role in the obliviousness of stab-victims) in life. The little things... they hurt. REALLY hurt . But, they won't kill you.

Look at that. We were built for greatness. Who would have thought it?

Everyone has scraped their knee before. There are literally billions of people on earth right now who should be walking around in T-shirts that say, "I Survived ~Knee-Scrape 20__". But they, like all of us, got up, brushed off, and got back to work.

If you're reading this, and you need to hear it, I'm sure it's not helping. That's the thing about "Crawl under a rock and die" moments... if you're anything like me, they can't be brushed off in .2 or less.

But hear this:
IT WILL GET BETTER.
IT WILL.

Scrape your knee: it IS only skin.
And it has a way of healing up nicely, if you give it enough time.