2:35 pm
In Plain Sight

I hate to be all "when I was young" but when I was young (a teenager in the 80s) I don't remember anyone being a cutter. Believe me, I was as detached as the best of them and cutting myself never entered my mind, although there was that incident with the failed scarification on my hand...

You might be thinking, "Oh, there were kids who cut themselves, you just didn't know it because they hid it," but I don't believe that. High schools are like small towns, word gets around. Even if I had never seen evidence of it (girls' locker room, anyone?), I still would have heard about it. And I never heard about it.

In terms of inflicting pain on oneself, my small band of friends was the ones doing it, if you consider piercing your ears multiple multiple times qualifying. Anyway, it's what I did to inflict pain on myself. But I suppose no one ever considered it a cry for help because even though having 9 holes in one ear was "weird" it wasn't outside the realm of socially acceptable. Multiple ear piercing had been around for a while (although most people stopped at 2).

It was a little early for the face and genital piercing trend. Only the really extreme were doing that (Genesis P-Orridge who currently looks like someone's style-challenged aunt). It was too much for me at the time and is still.

As much as I inflicted pain on myself as a teen (forgot to mention the slam dancing which is what we called it, not moshing), I'm a huge pussy about pain now a-days. Every time I bang an appendage on something, it hurts. It doesn't just hurt, it hurts like a motherfucker. I almost pass out when a wasp stings me. And forget about mammograms, I'm done for the rest of the day.

So kids now a-days. There's less talk about the cutting. Was it a fad? Was it a panic? Do less do this sort of thing that the media made/makes it out? Why didn't I think of it?

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