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# s/c/ar
- URL: https://mercuryretrogay.ghost.io/knees/
- Published: 2026-08-26T04:19:55.000Z
- Updated: 2026-08-26T04:20:35.000Z
- Author: Matty Kastellec

[Writer-ish Prompt #191](https://writerish.substack.com/p/micro-monday-191-silent-and-subtle?utm%5Fsource=post-email-title&publication%5Fid=1224396&post%5Fid=208770710&utm%5Fcampaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=false&r=bxg&triedRedirect=true&utm%5Fmedium=email): **Write about your knees.**

To write about my knees means to write about scars, but really one scar in particular. A jagged "C', it was acquired after a brief, unintentional flight through the air after I was bucked from an ATV at summer camp while taking a turn too fast. 

But let's back up a bit. 

For as long as I can remember, I had the urge to drive - and jealously of other drivers. I can still recall the envy I felt of the neighborhood kids who had an electric Barbie car or a plastic Jeep, and wondered how it would feel to be in command of a machine like that, to feel the speed of the asphalt rolling by. I could ride a bike, or race along in my Razor scooter, sure, but there was something about the engine of it all, the power drill to my simple screw driver. 

So you can understand that when given the option to sign up for once-a-week ATV periods the first summer of sleep away camp I was ecstatic, even though as a city kid an ATV was more theoretical than anything else. Being allowed to pilot something so boisterous, so loud, right on the edge of the limits...I felt the foolishness provided by adrenaline and it's false sense of invincibility. 

Smash cut back to the fateful turn, what I distinctly remember as being the first turn at the top of the hill after the start of the course, a sharp left onto a straight away. There had definitely been a few laps where I pushed the limits, feeling the momentary weightlessness as the two inner wheels lifted from centrifugal force. It turns out, I was closer to the limit than I realized, though it remains unclear how much I was thrown versus ditching out of some primal instinct to not get crushed beneath the vehicle. 

The result was the same, either way: a large chunk of flesh excised, narrowly and blessedly missing the patella or any tendons. A long ride to the nearest E.R. in a camp van, 8 sloppy stitches, and the subsequently long to heal scar. I am not sure how much of a lesson I learned; I was still driven to drive, getting my boating license at 13 and a permit long before most of my city peers ever touched a gear shift or turn signal. But maybe I have to a small degree - one fateful curve and I haven't ever thought of touching an ATV again.