I'm sitting at Hartford airport facing a lady of African descent. That wouldn't be particularly abnormal, but she has four parallel slashes down one side of her face. Too regular to be passing accidents. I'd have missed the detail entirely were it not for the fact that her scarred cheek is facing me directly. Some of her body language is tailored to hide it. She leans on her hand, which covers that cheek. Leans forward with an arm or wrist covering the scars partially. A sign of shame, or just of discomfort?
I wonder what her story is. I'd ask, but I know better than to accost a random stranger about something like that. It isn't always a fatally rude move, but in a situation like this, I don't think I could pull off the easygoing, slightly concerned air required for any possible non-hostile response.
Perhaps it was ritual scarring. She speaks a nonEnglish language. Perhaps an accident with mechanical equipment. Her three kids are unscarred, and also speak with an accent. Slight, mostly. I don't have trouble translating the words I can hear. I'm not a very good eavesdropper, though. Every passing noise drills into my sensory perceptions. Something keeps dinging, for instance. Like an elevator telling you the car is there, but every few seconds, and unpredictably. Announcements come over the PA system.
The lady with the scarred cheek going to Baltimore, not Grand Rapids, so I'll probably never see her again. I hope she'll be okay, and safe. She seems happy, but that's no indicator of the rest of her life.
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