I had an enormous crush on a girl in my kindergarten class. She was beautiful and had laughter like sunshine and made me feel all mushy. I wanted to express my affection with a grand romantic gesture.

But before I continue, there’s something I need to get out of the way:

I never, ever believed in Cooties. From the start I knew they were a complete and total sham. There was absolutely no way such wonderful creatures could play host to such a horrific disease. If Cooties did exist, I reasoned it was something worth catching.

One more thing:

On the way to my very first day of elementary school, a woman stood out front greeting the incoming students. I saw her from across the parking lot - a picture of beauty with long golden locks – and was immediately enamored. My mom told me this woman was my new kindergarten teacher. As I approached, she crouched down so we were eye to eye.

“Well hello there! What’s your name?”

“Michael ______ ________.” I had a habit of introducing myself by my full name.

“Nice to meet you, Michael. My name is Ms. Williams.” She shook my hand.

At the tender age of five I had not yet become insecure and nervous around attractive members of the opposite sex. (Years of awkward pubescence and mandatory social rituals would see to that.) I blurted out the first thing that coalesced inside my swirling, spinning mind.

“I think you’re as pretty as a rose.”

So now we’ve established two important facts:

Fact 1: Although I played along and received a vaccination (“Circle circle, dot dot, now you’ve got a Cootie shot!”), I did not for one moment think that Cooties was a real, or at least very deadly, disease.

Fact 2: I was a hopeless romantic upon exiting the womb.

Our playground was a 40/60 combination of tanbark and blacktop. The two tanbark sections were connected by a very old-looking wooden bridge. You could get from one area to the other without using the bridge, but that’s not very fun.

The playground was also adjacent to a residential neighborhood, and as such there were two fences - a wooden one surrounding the respective backyards and a chain link fence encompassing our campus. Some of the yards had trees, and a couple of them leaned over into school territory. One such tree was adorned with flowers which happened to suit one six-year-old boy’s discerning romantic tastes perfectly.

After assessing the situation I decided that my best route to the flowers was via the bridge. It was a fool-proof plan: I would climb atop the bridge’s four-foot-high railing, lean towards the fence, stretch out my arm and snatch the nearest flower to give to my dream girl.

Ah, the logic of a smitten six-year-old. I never once thought what might happen if I were to fall.

And oh, did I fall.

My fingertips were barely touching flower petals when I lost my balance and toppled downward. I didn’t feel my arm get caught on the chain link fence.

I remember sitting on the blacktop looking down at my arm and seeing a sizeable, fleshy rip down the middle. Without words or tears I walked over to the yard duty to let her survey the damage.

She stared at it aghast for a moment before calling over a fellow student to escort me to the health office. He and I talked casually as we walked down the hallway.

The school nurse bandaged me up and sent me on my way. I put my sweatshirt back on and hid the injury from my mom until the following day. I thought she’d be angry with me. When she eventually found out, she was angry. At the health office. If they would’ve called her she could have taken me to get stitches.

Instead I have this five-inch scar slinking down my arm to remind me of a fact that’s held true ever since that fateful day in kindergarten:

So often have I risked for women I’ve loved, and as many times have I gotten hurt.

Bonus: Chicks seem to dig the scar.

Irony: It’s kind of like a soldier appreciating the bullet wound left by a comrade in arms.