I have owie

Over the weekend, at the father/son campout, Spencer fell and bumped his lip. He has a very small, almost unnoticeable scratch above his upper lip. Up until today he has not noticed it or cared. But this afternoon while he was standing outside with a group of Carter's friends, one of the boys turned to him and said, "What did you do to your lip?"
Spencer touched his face, thought for a minute and said, "I fell. It's owie." Then he came running inside, almost in tears and said, "I need bandaid!"
I said, "No, you're fine. You don't need a bandaid. It won't stick on your lip anyway."
But undeterred, he went and got the entire box. "I need bandaid," he said. "I have owie." He handed me several, large bandaids.
"Spencer, it's not going to stay on your lip." I insisted.
"Yes it will!" He cried, approaching tears again.
So, I stuck a bandaid on. It was bigger than his entire upper lip and looked like a bandaid mustache. As I predicted, he kept it on for about five minutes and then said, "It bugging me." I think pulling the bandaid off was more painful than the original bump.

It made me think though, how influenced we are by the opinions and observations of others. It only takes one person to notify us of our blemishes and suddenly we think they are enormous -- like a big, obvious, bandaid mustache.