There are so many things that can make or break you. All of these things, over time, fit together like puzzle pieces and create something so uniquely twisted together that they create something all yours. That’s you.

One of the very first puzzle pieces that fits into the outline of my life happened one time when I was little. My family decided to go tubing down a river. We all got our swimsuits on and blew up our rafts. We had to walk half a mile through mosquito infested woods to get to the actual river but once we got there it was so worth it. There was a dam flowing, feeding into the river and there were turtles and birds everywhere. There were also green, leafy trees, soaring high all along the edge of the river and some even in it.

We waded in and were met with cool waves lapping at our feet. I decided to swim around before getting into my raft and so with my life jacket on, I was floating all over the place. You don’t really think about looking down when you’re swimming. You mostly look around at all the scenery but there was something in the water that day, something I didn’t notice before it was too late.

I floated right over an extremely large fallen tree trunk that was completely submerged in the water so that I couldn’t see it. All of the sudden it was there and I spotted it within milliseconds of hitting it. Before it could scrape my feet off, I tucked my legs up but it, in turn, got my knees. There were zebra mussels all along the tree and the outer rim of the shells, as sharp as scalpels, that cut straight through my skin.

I can’t remember but I’m sure I screamed as the shells cut my whole knee open. My dad swam over with new found speed and grabbed me out of the water to bring me on the shore. There was blood dripping down my leg and he had to wrap a towel around my knee to stop the blood. We were in the middle of the woods and I couldn’t really walk so my parents decided to float back down the river to the car. I was so scared to even get into the water but I had to so we could go get actual gauze for my knee. There were tears streaming down my face the whole way there and I had to close my eyes but I had made it.

Now, there’s just three white scars on my knee to prove that it even happened but I couldn’t imagine my life without them because they are a part of me now. Every time I look at them I remember all that happened and all the pain I was in when my knee was cut open. Any time I’m in great pain, I just think how I got through it once and I can do it again. The three scars are a symbol of strength, courage and bravery to me and I am reminded of that every day for whatever challenges I face.