Adventures that left scars on my face

Adventures that left scars on my face and head.

One adventure I mentioned before was my tumble off the plow horse. I don”t remember that for it was a tale I was told. Maybe I was acting up and it was a good way of explaining my behavior. However, I do have a little dimple near the receding hairline.
My arguments with the bees as a small boy did not leave a trace other then I swell up every time something bites me.I don’t remember the incident but the story should make me wary of bees and its bigger cousins.

I have a scar on my chin and it is not from my fights with any kids in Germany or USA. It is a trophy from falling down an icy sledding hill in the village of Harste. Maybe I was pushed ? I don’t remember.I was showing off by going down the hill without a sled. Well,I was bleeding and holding my chin with one hand and headed home. The local doctor happened to leave his office and saw me in the street and my red hands. He took me to his office and stitched me up. It took a few minutes to do the procedure. I was send home  with the instruction not to remove the bandage for a while. It cost my parent fifty cents for we had German government insurance. I wonder how long it would have taken in today’s circumstances?

If I look closely at the bridge of my nose and the left cheek of my face, I find a small railroad track impression. It is hard to find the tracks now with the aging process taking over. Well, that trophy came about in the playground by the church.I was playing a head-ball game which was a popular boys game at the time. The play area was near the broken wire fence that surrounded a war memorial and other graves.These must have been important since the rest of the playground was rumored 
to have been a cemetery. The ball came close to the fence and as I tried to head the ball away, a wire got in the way. A bleeding scratch across the cheek and nose.I was very lucky ...I could have lost one or both eyes.

On the edge by my left eyebrow I have a scar that did not go away with age. This mark
I received while participating in an evening before the wedding tradition. In the region they called it Polterabend. Everybody gathered things to throw on the ground before the bride’s door.I threw a can or jar and turned sideways into a broken bottle that a girl of my age was about to throw.It was congested with all those participants. I got away with just a small bleeding wound like a prizefighter. I never participated again after that incident.

In another incident I had a love affair with a Larch tree.My friends in the USA made fun of me the way I pronounced Larch.They thought I was saying large when I told the story.
The tree species that grew in the area was the Lerche (Larch). In Minnesota and Wisconsin grows the cousin called the Tamarack tree.I saw kids making a bridge against a wall by bending backwards while their palms slid down further and further.So I tried it against the trunk of the tree. I slipped and my reward was a big scratch across my right cheek.It hurt and I got a few scabs out of the experiment lasting nearly a week or more. I told everybody that I fell because I was alone and did not want any fingers pointing at me. I do have some pride. Yet, years later I could barely laugh about it. I still wince thinking about the kiss from that big tree.