Branding of the Working Class

I'd rather you didn't read this one mum xx

I'm clumsy.

Most people I know will attest to that.

Begining work in a fast-paced kitchen was bound to come with a few injuries, especially in conjuction to the fact I had next to no experience with kitchen equipment to begin with. It only took me a few weeks to obtain my first one. A panini press style grill sizzled into the back of my hand. I remember looking down at my white scorched flesh. Three perfectly straight lines ran down my hand and continued to the tips of my fingers. It wasn't a bad injury by any means, but it didn't go away. The following days bore witness to my skin washing away leaving behind a rose-pink memory. Months later and it's hardly visible unless I'm cold. Just as goosebumps prickle up and down my arms, my hand too illuminates a dark purple. I make light of it;  calling the lines my tiger stripes. I don't think people tend to notice them much, but I know they're there. I catch people's eyes flitting over them and consciously trying to look away. Their straight nature can't help but look intentional. In their early days I could feel people making assumptions.

My black eyeliner and scarred hand aligned with how they wanted to percieve me. It scares me that these scars won't leave. That one day I will be shaking hands with some oppulant executive and they'll immediately realise I am not as polished as my Eton contenders. I wonder whether Eton boys will ever be scarred from their minimum wage job. Whether they will work 55 hour weeks and come home bandaged and tired. I know that they won't. I wonder whether people will see my scars and stop thinking they're a reminder of teenage pain or however else people like to dress up self-harm. My skin has knitted and woven itself back together. My nerve endings frazzled and rekindled in futile knots trying to warn me when the water is too warm by leaping about in fired frenzy. I am grateful for my body, for it's ability to heal and grow. I resent that it has been left with so many brush strokes for which it did not deserve. Whenever I wash my hands, those three lines ignite. Irreparable harm from the burning grate. I was told this is because the body can continue burning deeper layers of tissue without your notice. In some cases this can lead to lack of dexterity or function altogether. I got lucky.

It used to make my mum sad to look at. She would give me bio-oil in efforts to speed along recovery. No mother wants to see a reminder of her child's pain. That, and on a deeper level, I think it's too close to  other scars that graced my hands previously. Sewn amid the lines I have small circular splotches of scarred tissue, My dalmatioin spots. Butts of cigerettes burried into my innocent flesh by my "friend" when we were 15. Buldging knuckles unsymetrical to their lefthand counterparts. Red tissue bleeding through the skin on my thumb from falling into a deep fryer. My very flesh beaten into submission in desperate pleas for a pay-check. Immense privilege reminds me to be grateful, but I cannot help but resent these Eton boys no matter how hard I try. I resent the bubble that cradles them, I resent their emotional illiteracy, but most of all I resent that my fellow passengers to the grave are just as human as me underneath their button-downs. For sometimes hearing them speak (cough cough Jacob Rees Mug head), they couldn't sound further from human.

Never mind the new breed creeping up amid universities of young socialites seeming to 'fetishise' working class struggles. Scribbling over mummy and daddy's riches. Dressing up in skin they do not possess. Defending the hardships they endured when daddy slept with the nanny because their upbringing was 'tough too'. Discussions of classism too often shrowded by unrelated social issues. Is it so hard to admit what you are?

This is by no means a sob story. Just a reminder to wear gloves maybe.