There’s some kind of disconnect in my brain when people are talking to me. Sometimes the words are crystal clear, and sometimes it sounds like they’re speaking over a remix of Major Tom, in German. As I try to block out the relentless techno rhythm, my eyes wander down to their mouths, in a pointless exercise of attempting to read lips.
Yesterday, I was speaking with a black man (excuse my political incorrectness) with a bit of an accent.
“My kid ever talks to me like that,” control is not convinced “he get my foot” but the computer has the evidence. “right up his ass.” No need to abort. By the time the countdown starts, I am transfixed by his gum.
Why isn’t he chewing his gum? It’s just sitting there on his … Oh dear God! He has a green stud in his tongue!
This would not have bothered me so much, except that he was clearly in his forties. I have little room to talk, since I was in my forties when I got my nipple pierced. As an aside, I don’t understand how, having just had your lady parts skewered by a sharpened piece of stainless steel, you would want to get the other one pierced as well. So I walked around for two days with one breast swollen to twice its normal size.
Back to the subject, I think there should be some basic rules in place for senior body piercings.
If a woman is old enough that she would rather be hit by a bus than wear a thong, she grew up long before people started piercing their tongues. You’re not impressing her with your lingual hardware.
Ladies, if you were going braless, would people mistake your nipple ring for a navel ring? You probably want to reign the girls in or get a longer shirt.
Now for a delicate subject: Men, at a certain age, you may find your hair migrating from the top of your head to your ears and nose. Do you really want bling drawing the eye to an ingrown mustache or a bush growing out of the side of your head? As a personal observation, I don’t think combovers and earrings are a good combination.
Facial piercings are better left to punk rockers who won’t need a neck brace if they start head banging.
So at what age should you give up on body piercings? As a general rule of thumb, I believe that once your skin starts sagging, you don’t want a piece of metal bobbing up and down when you nod your head. By the way, I’ve long since removed the nipple ring. I don’t have any shirts long enough. Great, now I have Major Tom stuck in my head!
I never felt the need to pierce anything, let alone get tattoos… but you’re right. At a certain point it shifts between the headbanger who routinely sets off metal detectors to the middle aged guy desperate to stave off the ravages of time and looking ridiculous in the process.
I take it this Major Tom song is pretty thoroughly obnoxious?
You wild woman you! I remember begging for my first bra at the same time my mother said she was burning all of hers….Funny how the world changes. I sure hate the suckers!
When I think of women with tattoos, I don’t see a young woman with a firm body and a biker boyfriend. I imagine her at sixty or seventy, with everything sagging so that the tattoos are no longer distinguishable, gray hair, a tank top that hangs far too low on the boobs, and baggy shorts–a beer in one hand and a cigarette in the other.
Which reminds me…you know how women “of a certain age” get hairs growing out of inappropriate places like their chins? Most will tweeze those unsightly hairs–but I saw a woman the other day who had several–and they were long and curling. Ick!
Actually, I have a tattoo on my shoulder. Also, a 40 year-old thing. I have no problem sporting a tank top because I keep forgetting it’s there.
My big deal for my 40th birthday (a 100 years ago) was to get a second ear piercing right next to the proper, original one. That was a really big deal for me. I sported two silver balls on each lobe, instead of one. ohhhhhh. I was a rock star.
As for tattoos, I always wanted a little star tattooed on my shoulder, but never ventured farther than the bar next door to the tattoo parlor. After a couple drinks, or three, I was able to see clearly that pain was not an option for me. I’m weird that way.
However, and in response to Norman above, I would have to say that I have the same unattractive mental pictures of men and their tattoos at a certain age. Skin Saggage and Hair Sneakage knows no male/female boundaries. It’s ugly either way. Just sayin..
Someday all these young people covered with body piercings and tatoos are going to be old, too. That should be a wonderful sight! Can you imagine eyebrow rings on sagging bushy brows?
I’ve thought of a tattoo before…then realized that I would get old, and it just wouldn’t be attractive anymore. Yeah, best to just not do it…especially in saggy areas. Just not a good look.
I suppose the critical factor is how big it is… and where it is.
I’d have to say good advice on the body piercings.