The Stories We Keep

Years ago now, I was tattooing this gnarly old hippy and he asked me what happened to my ear. It surprised me a little. I shrugged and said time and poor impulse control. He liked that, but he clearly wanted a story, so I asked him how he got the ancient scar that cut from the edge of his upper lip up toward his ear.

“Ah, that.” He nodded. “It was the early 70’s and I was in Northern California at this giant party in the woods. LSD was unpredictable in those days so the trick was to take as much as you could when you came across it, which is what I did. Two hits of Orange blotter and boy I was on the moon watching the Earth turn into a giant transistor radio. I was too high and I knew it, so when Someone passed me a bottle of whiskey I drained it and I pretty much passed out. When I woke up, oh my god it was awful, I had a mixed-bag hangover and I was wet from sleeping in the rain. Sun was up and everyone was gone, the whole clearing was trashed to shit, so I went looking for water and the road. I wandered for a time and came to a huge field and on the far side I could see the highway, so I started walking. Seemed like an hour went by and I was halfway there. I thought, shit, I might be walking in circles out in this field so I trained my eye on a lone fencepost right by the road. I walked. I stumbled and staggered. I was still pretty wasted. But finally, finally I was almost there, almost to that post, and as I came up on it I realized I’d walked across that huge field all drug and blazing and I never fell down, and just like that I tripped and smashed my face right into the post. Broke my nose and got this here scar.” He smiled proudly. “You know what I learned from that?” I was about to answer when he stopped me. “Nothin’ boy, I didn’t learn nothin’. There ain’t a lesson in everything.”

Well, blow my mind.