It was the morning of the Watauga High School band’s trip to Carowinds, I want to say sophomore year. I showered as usual and headed to my parents’ bathroom to scout out a q-tip to dry my ears. And when I say “dry my ears”, you know it went a little farther than that.
It always started out as just drying my ears, and one of my mom’s sayings, along with “If you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all”, was “Don’t put anything in your ear that’s smaller than your elbow”, but as I’ve mentioned, I have my dad’s ear wax genes, and I could never help but dig in there a little bit and pull out a satisfyingly disgusting wax-coated swab of cotton.
Maybe I was a little aurally fixated because I’d had a shit-ton of ear problems as a kid. Frequent, angry ear infections. Throbbing pain that I remember vividly thirty years later. Seriously, I recall looking up at my mom, who I know now must’ve been dying to see her five-year-old in such agony, and thinking, “How are you letting this happen?” Anyway, I had to have tubes put in my ears. Twice! To this day, when doctors look in my ears for the first time, they go, “Whoa!… Um, so you’ve got some scar tissue in there, huh?”
This particular morning in high school, after I’m certain I spent a half-hour picking out the perfect outfit to impress Robbie, probably involving matching shirt and scrunchy socks, I got really into the “ear drying”, and I just went a little too deep into my right ear canal. A little tap on something inside, and I found myself eye-level with the bolts that kept the toilet anchored to the floor. Totally horizontal, like that, in an instant. My ear felt a little tender but didn’t hurt. It was just weird, was all, that I could’ve been so undeniably standing in one moment, and in the next on the fucking ground.
I began to pick myself up, but even weirder, when I raised my head more than three inches, it was—no joke—like someone was holding me down. I could not make myself vertical.
Of course, I was not thinking that I may have done some major damage to myself. I was freaking out that I might miss the charter bus, and Robbie would never see that the coral and aqua in my earrings was exactly the same as the coral and aqua in my shirt, and uuugggghhhhh, why me?
But eventually, over the course of about 20 minutes, I raised myself up a few inches at a time until I was able to stand and stagger out of the bathroom. I went on the trip, and it’s unclear whether Robbie appreciated my fashion choices—he played cat and mouse with me for, oh, about three more years.
I have no recollection of where my family was during this incident. Maybe my parents had already left for work, but my brother must’ve been in the house because he was the captain of our ’83 Subaru GL (I was quartermaster, and by that I mean I managed the Led Zeppelin cassettes). Was I too embarrassed to call out for him? No idea.
Anyway, clearly the moral of this story is, do not match your accessories perfectly. It looks like you’re trying too hard on the band trip.
Blasphemy. Always match your accessories perfectly.
I love this story.
Tell it again.
Haha, Cort!
It was the morning of Watauga High School’s band trip…
Yeah, I never heard this story until years later. I was probably concentrating too hard on my mullet.
We do use this story with Annabelle as a precautionary tale — told right after the one where I pee on Dad’s leg.
It was an *’84* Subaru–and thereby lies a tale! I graduated from PA school, got a job, and immediately went out and bought a car to replace one of the hand-me-downs from Granny Scott. Not only did the salesman feel free to keep giving me way-too-familiar hugs but in Nawth Cahlahna at that time I had to get my husband to cosign my loan even though I was paying for it all by myself and my income was perfectly adequate to qualify for the loan without any help from anybody.
And, in case you wanted to know, the auditory nerve that runs along your ear canal to your brain so you can interpret the sound waves picked up by the delicate apparatus in your ear is also known as the vestibulocochlear nerve–vestibulo-, as in balance.
AND, I don’t believe I ever said “if you can’t say something nice…”–you heard that in the movie of Bambi. But you’re right about my feeling bad about seeing you in agony–the worst time was when three supposedly competent adults stood there and watched you chewing on something in Granny Scott’s living room. I came in and shrieked (actually I probably didn’t shriek because that’s not my style, but it felt like a shriek) “how long has she been chewing on that roach poison?” Holding you down so you could get your stomach pumped at the hospital was pure agony. Then there was holding you still so you could get the rectal suppository to zone you out before the operation on your thumbs…
What, Mom?! It was an ’84?! I’ve been living a lie all these years.
Also, I thought I got a shot in my butt, not a suppository. Wow. Memory is a faulty thing.
OK. I believe you on all the other stuff, but I call bullshit on the “If you can’t say something nice”. You said that ALL THE TIME. Siblings? Please weigh in.
Corroborated. Bambi may have said it first, but that bit of wisdom was used by Mom almost as frequently as Dad said, “the ox is slow, but the earth is patient.”
I can’t help you with what happened to your butt.
NOBODY could have said anything as often as Pop said “The ox is slow…” but I will accede on the issue of my having said “If you can’t…” at least once or twice, given your collective memory. If you remember it so vividly, you must have been saying not nice things to each other rather a lot. ;-)
Oh wow. THAT entire exchange made me happy. Really really happy.
me too!
i’ll NEVER forget the day in gym class when we did the national fitness test or whatever that bullshit was. all the girls were sitting in a row along the wall, watching the boys climb the ropes. i sat there with my black stirrup pants and hot pink scrunch socks and long sweater that was hot pink, but not quite the hot pink my socks were . . . when . . . everyone started talking about how perfectly matchy matchy your socks and tops NEEDED to be. had to be the exact same color or else it didn’t count. what?!!!? of all days to spark this conversation?! UGH.
just one more of the times in middle school when i felt i didn’t belong. thanks for making me relive it, ame. ;-)
I’m glad this story didn’t end with the q-tip shoved deeper into your ear as I was imagining and cringing at the thought. As an FYI; I can’t stand when people touch/examine/feel my ears or eyes.