The ice on my earlobe is dripping down my neck and the pain on my lobe makes me pull the ice away. Heidi is telling me to keep the ice on there so it will get numb. I put it back on the front of my earlobe and every so often switch to the back. We're laughing and talking like any 13 year old's would. About boys and friends.
Here I am at one of the coolest girl's house from school. She has invited me to spend the night and I am just feeling so lucky. Her bedroom is huge and she has her own bathroom. Her bedroom is twice the size of my parents bedroom! Heidi is beautiful. Long dark brown hair with these big brown eyes. Really white teeth and an incredible smile. Her family doesn't seem to hover over her perhaps because she is the youngest with brothers. I feel like the ugly duckling next to her but I am so happy she has invited me over.
Heidi wonders if I want my ears pierced. I tell her my mom won't let me. She asks why, whats wrong with pierced ears? Heidi offers to pierce them. My mom doesn't need to know. I can hide them. It doesn't take me long to say yes. Heidi goes and gets some ice and brings it back to her room. We have music playing on the record player and she is telling me how she will be doing it. I need to keep the ice on my ear till they feel really numb. She finds a sewing needle and some matches. She is telling me that once my ear is numb that she will light the match and run the needle through it. That's to sterilize it. Then she will poke the needle through my ear. Once that is done she will leave the needle in for a short time and then put an earring on afterwords.
Heidi has lots of of earrings. Long dangling earrings with small beads that look so hippy like. I want to be a hippy. If this will get me closer to that status then I will do it. I want to be cool. I want to dress like the rest of the cool girls. She finds some small posts that I will wear for a month till my ears have healed then I can wear any kind of earrings I want after that.
I think my ear is quite numb now. She has marked my ear with a pen so she will know where to put the needle through. I am a bit scared as I don't like needles. Then she does it. I do cry out but then she is done. My ear feels hot and is pounding but not as bad as the numb feeling. I don't know how many ears Heidi has pierced but she doesn't seem to think anything of it. We have to wait now for my other ear to be numb. She puts the post in the ear while we wait. I can't believe that now I too will have pierced ears. All my girlfriends have pierced ears and none of their mom's minded. What is the big deal?
The next day when I go home I walk in the door hoping to not see my mom. I wear my long hair parted down the middle and covering my ears quite well. So far so good. It's not like my mom and I sit face to face much or talk if I can help it. Except for dinner where we all sit together. The first day I am fine but the second day at dinner I am caught. She wants to know what I have on my ears. I tell her there is nothing there. She persists and then pulls my hair away. The posts are plain to see. She is livid. I am told to take them out, right now! I am sent to my room, which is a common event at my age. When all else fails send Ellen to her room. Grounding was a weekly deal as well. My mom must have eyes everywhere!
I come up with a great idea. When I leave the house I put the earrings right back in. When I am home I take them out. Heidi tells me it will take longer to heal taking the earrings off and on like that and to use alcohol to keep them clean so they don't get infected. So this is what I do. This plan works for a week till one day I come home from school and I forgot to take the earrings out. Busted! I said she was livid before, well now she is furious with me. My lesson is I can't fool my mom and get away with it. I should know this but I keep trying to outwit her. I stop wearing the earrings and just keep asking her when I can get them pierced. If I do this long enough maybe she will give in.
Southern rule about pierced ears. Pierced ears are what cheap women do. I guess she is telling me that my friends with pierced ears are cheap women in the making. No proper young lady wears them. Clip on earrings are fine and I can wear those. They don't make cool earrings that clip on! What hippy wears clip on earrings? This is the logic I received from my mom. Looking back at it I can understand her feelings that way based on her upbringing. She wasn't seeing that styles and opinions had changed or attitudes towards them as well. For her there was no reasoning of this issue. When I was 15 she finally relented and let me get them pierced. It was done by the doctor she worked for who did it in his office. Yes, at that time you went to a professional to have it done. Anyone else and there would be problems. If you look at my ears you can see where Heidi pierced my ears as the holes never fully closed. It bothers me that the doctor didn't do it in the same place or check to see if an earring would go through the first holes. My victory was won and proved that one could have pierced ears and not be a floozie. My mom never did come to approving of them but she stopped arguing with me on this. Of course I was allowed to only wear small hoops of gold. Not the kind that dangle. That came soon enough though.
