You never appreciate your mortality so much as when you’ve been injured.

“Scale this up a little, and I’m dead.”

It’s the little wounds that make me think the most. The other day I was trying to open a stubborn container of creamer and before I knew it my knuckle was gushing blood from a scrape. A little thing like that had the power to wound me so deeply I still carry the scar of it wrapped in bandaids.

That’s what it was like with Maxine. She gave me but a little nick, but the scar stayed with me to this day—and I’ve often wondered how much more it would have taken to end me.

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