A week ago (has it only been a week?), I went with a group of folks to Forbidden Fruit, where Emily got tattooed. It would have cost me more money than I had to get my eyebrow pierced, which made me kind of sad.

But I am sad no more, people, because yesterday? I got my eyebrow pierced.

I'd heard the eye area is pretty sensitive and a piercing can leave quite a nasty bruise sometimes. I wanted to be sure I timed it well so that I wouldn't have to deal with questions or reactions from co-workers (or my students, for that matter).

Right after I'd finished teaching for the day, I headed down to Berkeley, and spent a week trying to find a parking spot. I finally grabbed a 30 minute meter, and tried not to worry about getting ticketed should the time run out. As it turned out, no one else was waiting to be pierced, and the whole process was pretty quick. I signed the form, forked over my card, and was in the piercing chair.

"You nervous?" the piercer guy asked.

I said I was.

"It's okay. Just relax. This is like nothing. It'll hurt a lot less than your nose piercing."

I was so relieved to hear that, and told him so! "'Cause that hurt a LOT!" I said.

He cleaned my brow, then ran his thumb along my brow bone several times, feeling for the best location to pierce. He put little ink dots on my face and told me, "I think it'll work best there, because your hairline is actually higher than your browbone. If I put the piercing higher, I think it'll have a higher chance of rejecting. What do you think about it being right here?" He pointed to the ink dots with his toothpick type of stick that he'd used to draw them.

"I think that's awesome," I said.

He put the chair back so that I was lying down, and it made some really crazy squeaky noises! I took several deep breaths, as instructed. Then he said he'd put the needle through on the next exhale. I breathed a super deep breath in through my nose, then slowly but forcefully blew it out through my mouth. And when I did so, I felt a sharp, but quick pain. "Ow!" I thought, waiting for worse pain to follow. But it didn't. Then he said he was putting the jewelry in, which I felt, but there was no pain.

"There," he said. "How was that?"

"Wow. That was awesome! It hurt a lot less than I thought it would."

"Yeah, eyebrows are pretty easy," he said.

He told me how to care for it and keep it clean, then handed me a care sheet with all the info on it. He also gave me his card and the hours he works, and told me to call with any questions. He was so cool and friendly. Plus, he just had a nice voice and a calm kind of energy about him. A very cool person to get pierced by!

I checked myself out in the mirror and was a little surprised by how big the balls on the end of the barbell are. I thought they'd be a bit smaller. He said I could get different jewelry for it in a few months, if I wanted to. That's cool. And even though it's a bit different than I'd expected, I still like it a lot!

I made sure he got his tip (I'd put it on my card), then happily walked back to my car, where I saw that I had seven minutes left in the meter. Wow! That was fast! As I drove home, I was amazed at the lack of soreness, and kept trying to check myself out in the rearview mirror at every red light! I just kept thinking, "I can't believe I finally did it!"

I got home and had to share with someone, so I called my mom, then a couple of friends, but no one was home. I IM-ed my brother, and he thought it was cool. Then Mom called me back and congratulated me. Yay!

I wanted to tell Joe, but at the same time, I wanted to wait and see his reaction in person. We met at IKEA later in the evening to look at some furniture, and he didn't notice at first. It wasn't until we were sitting and talking on one of the display couches that he said, "Hey, you got your eyebrow pierced!"

We talked about it a bit, and I think it kind of freaked him out. He said it looked like it hurt. He also said it looked like I'd been stabbed in the eye. "Well, that's kind of what happened," I said.

I think he's getting used to it.

I love it. I'm not sure what it is that attracts me to piercings and tattoos and such. I just know I'm excited to finally have the piercing I've been wanting for a while. It just feels right. And I'm happy!