Pierced!

I had my ear pierced on Saturday night. I've been wanting an earring for some time now, and was planning on asking my wife, Molly, for one as a Father's Day gift. (See my earlier blog posting, "Mid-life Vanities.") But there we were wandering through Crossgates Mall - Molly, myself, and our two small children - and there was Claire's Boutique, a chain jewelry store. (There's probably one in your area.)

We were about to pass the store, but I suddenly stopped in front of it, pointed inside, and made a few whimpering noises.

"Get one if you want," Molly said with a sigh.

"It can count as my Father's Day gift," I told her. "How long do you think it will take?" She was a woman, she should know about these things.

"Probably about 15 or 20 minutes," she answered, and then explained that she and the kids would be in the Disney Store; I should meet them there when it was over.

"You do ear piercings here, right?" I asked a salesgirl. She told me they did, and then handed me a piece of cardboard with various "starter" earrings listed, along with their prices. After looking at the prices for awhile - knowing that Molly wouldn't really be supportive of this if it cost more than $20 or $25 - I decided on a 4 MM white gold post. The salesgirl, however, steered me towards a 3 MM post, explaining that it was even cheaper, and they sold them singly, as opposed to in pairs. Good catch, salesgirl!

(I don't know what the salesgirl's name was, but from here on, I'll call her 'April.' I like the name, and I liked her; she was about 18 or 19 years-old, and cute.)

April began filling-out a form of some kind, from a pad of forms she'd pulled from beneath the register. She took my name and address from my driver's license, then asked me how old I was.

"Thirty-eight," I said, and snickered.

"I'm sorry," she said, putting my age on the appropriate blank. "But I have to ask." She leaned over the counter as she scribbled, giving me an eyeful of her ample cleavage.

"Oh, I don't mind telling you my age! I just... don't you think it's old to be getting your ear pierced for the first time?"

"Nah," April said. She turned the pad of forms around to face me, and had me sign my name in two places, and initial six others. I was agreeing to follow their post-piercing ear care instructions, acknowledging that I was aware of the possibility of infection, and agreeing that I wouldn't hold the store liable if something unseemly should happen to me as a result of the piercing.

April took a copy of the signed form and crammed it into a small gift bag, along with ear care instructions and two 4-ounce bottles of antiseptic. The gift bag was hot pink in color, and bore the legend, "JUST GOT MY EARS PIERCED AT CLAIRE'S." For a moment, I imagined traipsing through the mall with my cute pink gift bag, like Little Red Riding Hood on the way to grandmother's, carrying her cute little basket of goodies.

"We can put that bag into a white plastic bag," another salesgirl (not April) said. And she promptly did just that.

"Thanks," I told her. "It is a tad... dainty." I was trying to come across as masculine as I could. These were two very attractive girls, and here I was buying an earring - for myself - in a store marketed towards women. It would serve me well to portray myself as close to a biker dude as I could, as opposed to an effeminate girly-man.

April charged me $17.84 for the piercing and the earring. I paid by check. Then she asked me to follow her, and we headed towards the front of the store, and the mall. There at the store's entrance was a stool and a four-foot tall cabinet unit. Apparently, Claire's Boutique likes to make a spectacle of their ear piercing practice, performing the piercing in full view of passers-by in the mall. The idea, I suppose, is to attract more customers to come in and get their ears pierced. I sat down on the stool as April dug some things out of the cabinet.

"Okay. Which ear are we doing?"

"Oh, the left!" I said. Did April think I was gay? If so, I wasn't doing too good a job at being 'masculine.'

"I have to ask," April explained. "Some people don't know." That is, some men don't know that left means straight, and right means gay. But these aren't hard and fast rules anymore these days; many straight men choose to get both ears pierced, or have two piercings in the left ear and one in the right, etc.

"I'm thinking right about here," April said, and made a small pen mark on my left earlobe. Then she held up a mirror. "Whaddya think?"

I looked at the spot where April had made the pen mark. "Looks right," I said. Surely she had done quite a few ear piercings, and knew a good spot to place it. I trusted her judgement.

"This is your first piercing?" she asked, still fiddling about with things from the cabinet. I told her it was. "No tattoos?" she asked. I told her no. "Well, I'm honored to be the one to be your first!" It was an intimate thing to say to me, could easily be turned around into something sexual - the loss of my virginity. I muttered something in response, and probably turned red.

"Here we go," April announced. "It shouldn't really hurt." Peripherally, I saw her come at me with something that looked like a staple gun. Click. I felt just a brief second of pressure-pain, and then it was over. "All done. Did that hurt?"

"Nope," I said. Again, I wanted to seem like a tough guy. To tell her it hurt like hell (it didn't) would've been the whining of a pantywaist.

April explained the after-piercing ear care procedures I'd have to perform for the next six weeks at home. I had a couple of qualifying questions - making sure I understood her correctly - and she answered them. Then I said goodbye. I felt as if April and I had shared something intimate together.

I took a couple steps into the mall, and there was Molly. She had wheeled the stroller back from the Disney Store just in time to see the deed being done. "Did it hurt? It looks good," she said.

We continued shopping in the mall. It was another half-hour before I braved a look into a mirror.

It looks good. Damn, I'm cool. I think.