piercings

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Job Prospects & Embodiment

I grew up with a very laid back mom.

Read more: Job Prospects & Embodiment

She allowed me to gauge my ears in middle school, and I got my first tattoo, a large forearm piece, in high school (which I do sometimes regret). To this day, I still seek out that thrill of body modifications. It was yesterday that I stretched my ears to the next size up, 9/16″, just a few away from my goal of 3/4″. I have a helix and some facial piercings, and I only plan on getting more. The same can be said for tattoos. I have a list of ones I want, and my following list on Instagram is filled with artists who I want flash pieces from.

Some people ask about things like professionalism and job prospects with my visible tattoos and stretched ears, but at the end of the day, it’s all me. I don’t want to let some corporate entity control how I feel most at home with myself. I’m realizing more and more as I grow into myself that there are so many things that are inherent to me as a person, and tattoos and piercings are some of those things. They’re a part of my identity at this point. They’re how I embody myself.

All of that is to say, I think there is an art of making yourself your own. Creating your body and molding it how you please is a part of the human experience. It isn’t just our limbs that are extensions of ourselves – hair, mobility aids, tattoos, piercings, surgical scars – they’re all extensions of who we are. Piercings and tattoos are how I express myself, and my gender as a trans person. I am reclaiming a body that, as an AFAB individual, has been claimed by society.

There are a lot of ways people make their bodies their own. I think it’s very human, and very beautiful (regardless of job prospects).

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Piercings

When I was eight, the first piercing into my body was for a ritual, a gentle whisper of tradition inscribed on the skin. Or maybe these were the things little girls did, bearing a tiny badge of belonging. I didn’t question it, didn’t need to. It fell into the soft quilt of childhood.

At twenty, a sharper needle danced across my skin: a second lobe, a nose ring, a tragus. These weren’t whispered rites; they were restless proclamations. Boredom had seeped into my bones, and the sting of metal felt like a remedy, a spark against the dull ache of routine.

But the tragus rebelled, itching, and inflamed, and was eventually lost, snagged in the tangle of intimacy during a hug. A small casualty, nonetheless one that left its mark within memory memory of touch and unintentional loss.

Now, they hang silent companions. Some days, they feel like artifacts of whimsy I can’t quite justify. On other days, they’re ornaments of a self I’ve grown to understand. Mistakes? Maybe. Or maybe they are just chapters, stitched in by silver and steel, each adding texture to the story I wear.

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Snug as a bug in a…thing that shouldn’t be in your ear

Almost exactly nine months ago I made a spontaneous decision. This is rare for me. I like to research, I like to Google something until all the links are purple from me visiting them. I’ll ask other people about things, I’ll read books on it, I’ll run through scenarios in my head for days before an event happens to try to think of all the possible outcomes and reactions. It makes me indecisive but it’s my process and it keeps me from freaking out. Very rarely do I do something without agonizing about it first, and much less often does it involved sticking needles in my face. Continue reading →