A Walk on the Wild Side

GrumpoGirl had ruled for three days and, while the situation that brought her out of the closet has not changed, life goes on. Fretting and worrying is nonproductive and doesn't make anyone feel better. So I dosed myself with chocolate and decided to take a walk on the wild side.

Years ago, I had my ears pierced. Just one hole in each. I don't think it's a good idea to make alterations to my body that I might not be able to reverse. I'd never get a tattoo even if the President, the Pope and my Mom all had tats.

The hole through the right ear was never quite right. The opening in the back was a little lower than the hole in the front, so any time I wanted to put in an earring, I would have to fish around inside my ear for the hole on the other side. Over the years it became painful as well as inconvenient. My earring wearing frequency decreased until the hole closed up a few months ago.

The problem is that wearing earrings has become my formal declaration of being dressed up. How could I prove to the Engineer or the public at large that I was properly attired unless I sported the exclamation points of earrings. I needed to fix that ear.

So I did my research and discovered that Koi was the best place in town to get a piercing done. When I called on the phone they sounded very professional and knowledgeable. So I took a shower then hied my clean head and hair down to Koi to get the job done.

When I walked in the receptionist was busy, so I wandered around the periphery of the room, examining various pieces of body jewelry. It is absolutely astonishing to me what some folks will stick through their body parts -- and which body parts they'll stick them through. The receptionist had earplugs that were about 3/4 of an inch in diameter. They were silver tubes flared at both ends. Four inch diameter silver rings hung from the tubes, making a shoop-shoop noise as they rocked in their cradles. She had a rhinestone in the V at the base of her neck. I did not ask where else she might be perforated.

I selected a simple opal/titanium stud from the array of silver, gold, bone, horn and lord-only-knows-what and waited to be called into the piercing room.

A man with two-inch blue plugs in his ears and a small horn protruding from his lower lip escorted me into the room and had me sit on the examining table. There were sockets for stirrups at the foot end. As I tried not to appear gauche staring at his totally tattooed arms I commented that I would probably flee the premises were there stirrups in the sockets.

He said, "We only put them in if we need them."

"Oh. Umm... Nice tattoo on your throat. Is it vertebrae or a dagger?"

It was a dagger, he opened his collar to show me the blade. Then he washed, gloved up and examined both of my ears so he could make the new hole match the other side. He was insulted when I asked if he'd use a piercing gun. He obviously considered that technology to be totally uncivilized. He used a needle. The piercing itself was unexciting and not very painful. No blood, unlike the first time when the blood ran in rivers down my neck and onto my collar. He inserted the stud and gave me instructions and a fact sheet on after-care. It was all very business-like.

I told one of my friends later that day that I'd been to Koi.

She gave me a horrified look and blurted out, "Did you get your hoo-hoo pierced? I have a friend who got her hoo-hoo pierced there."

I grinned and let her wonder.

Seems that they really do have a use for those stirrup sockets.