There are various things I often mutter to myself about or even out loud at times and two of these are body piercing and tattoos.
About 37 years ago I had my ears pierced. "Why?" you ask. I have always loved to wear earrings and I found clip-ons either fell off or where too tight or sometimes in a pair there were both problems. I also didn't like the screw-on type for almost the same reasons. I therefore, along with my daughter, went to a reputable jeweller in Perth to have the deed done. K said she'd have hers done too but only after mine were done and she saw that it wasn't all that painful. Quite honestly it was no real problem and I did the right thing afterwards and kept turning the sleepers for the required time and then purchased several pairs of pretty earrings. K and I both still wear pierced earrings.
Since then of course thousands of people have decided they too want to be pierced but not just to wear a pair of earrings. Some decide they want to wear up to a dozen pairs at one time (is that an exaggeration perhaps?) but it is the other parts of the face and body that I find appalling. I know it is perhaps just me but when I see folk (male and female) with piercings in their nose, eyebrows, cheeks, tongues etc. it literally makes me feel quite ill. I realise that in tribes in other lands this type of behaviour is quite commonplace and they have many reasons (tribal etc) for doing it but does it have meaning to people in the Western world or is it just "the thing" to do? Phil even thought it strange when I had my ears pierced but then husbands don't always understand their wives do they?
In regard to tattoos I've noticed that many footballers in all codes today have multiple tattooing done and this I find quite hideous at times. I was watching a game of Aussie Rules (our team won by the way) and there was a player in the opposing team that had tattoos completely covering both arms. To me he looked as though he'd fallen in a pile of mud and not bothered washing the mud off. I could see nothing beautiful in it at all. I know ladies will sometimes have a small butterfly, heart or other object tattooed on a shoulder or less visible place and I will go along with that. I even thought of it myself years ago but decided not to because I asked myself 'why?"and "do I really need to? This is the type of thing I had in mind back then.
Recently on Facebook I saw a picture of what would have been a pretty tattoo a lady had had done where the red had caused a type of cancer and the whole area of the tattoo was raised up and swollen. It seemed she would have to undergo three operations to remove the damage or one big operation including plastic surgery. I felt sorry for her as it was the red ink that had caused the cancer and you could tell she'd had a rather elegant tattoo for reasons known only to her perhaps. Obviously tats are difficult to get rid of even if they've not caused any problems and I wonder how some of these men (and women too perhaps) will look when they are 60 or 70 years old and the skin on their arms, and other places, has sagged as it does with the help of gravity on all of us.
I would really enjoy reading your comments about the above. Do you too have likes and dislikes that you usually keep to yourself and yet feel it would be good to find out how others feel about them. If you have a topic then let me know and we'll see if we keep this Monday Mutterings going for a while. I am not sure how long I can come up with things that I ponder about but we'll see how it goes.
