Technically speaking, a perfect piercing might be made up of a nice combination of great placement, uneventful healing, low degree of stinky funk, and good, quality jewelry. However, as anybody with even some small amount of piercing experience knows, there are some extra elements that are not immediately obvious but are perhaps even more important than those previously mentioned. A perfect piercing has a lot to do with who it's on, what it means to them, and if it's the right piercing for them. For example, I could go out and get my eyebrow pierced today, and it would probably look pretty good; since I'm sexy as hell as it is, after all, however, I know this is not the piercing for me, at least not at this particular time, and so while I might like it, it would not ascend the category of "accessory" to the category of "part of me."
At A Glance Author Aaron Contact hatch@fordham.edu When Six months ago Artist Brian Decker Studio Sacred Tattoo Location Canal Street, NYC A perfect piercing does not just become a part of a person after they get it, it's almost as if the piercing was there to begin with, at least internally, and the hole in their skin is simply a physical projection of something that was really there all along. And unfortunately, sometimes you don't even realize you have the perfect piercing until it's gone.
I was first introduced to inner conch piercing sometime in the summer of 2004. Although I visited BME often and spent a good deal of time paging through the image galleries looking at all the different work, fiending for some of my own, I admittedly was not that well versed in the world of cartilage piercing. At the time it simply did not hold very much interest to me, and I had a fairly shallow understanding of what it was. It was not until a girl walked into the gas station where I worked with the most amazing, captivating piercing I had ever seen that my education in inner conch piercings began.
This particular girl was just an ordinary customer. She came in, picked up a few things, and left. But the minute she walked into the store my eyes locked on the piercing in her ear. She had an assortment of others in her ear as well, all of which I cannot remember. In fact, I was so transfixed on her inner conch that if she had told me her name that day I probably would not have remembered that either. Something about the piercing interested me so deeply. It was so unique to me, so original, and yet seemed so natural. It almost begged inside of me, why did we bother piercing earlobes at all if this is an option! This was simply a piercing that belonged in the ear. It was so graceful, so charming, and so complimentary. "Why hasn't anybody else thought of that!" I wondered. Of course, plenty of other people had, which I would soon discover.
As soon as my shift let out I rushed home, eager to get on BME and search around the image galleries for this piercing. Quickly enough I learned it was called an inner conch piercing, and after that I browsed through piles of pictures. The girl I had seen had a very standard piercing, a simple 14-gauge hoop, but the incredible variety of options for this piercing enticed me. As soon as I saw several pictures with large gauge rings wrapped around people's ears I knew that I wanted something similar. Aside from just looking cool, something about it pulled at me more strongly than other piercings I've had and I believe now that it's because I was simply meant to have it. For reasons spiritual or otherwise, the conch piercing was going to be an important part of my body that I was at this time completely unaware of.
The inner conch piercing remained in the back of my mind for the rest of summer, gently nagging. However, I was currently very preoccupied with getting my nipples pierced, and because those would be easier to hide from my very conservative, anti-piercing mother I opted to get those pierced first. It wasn't long after that though that the nagging in the back of my mind grew impossible to ignore, and several months later I knew I had to get my conch pierced else I might as well not even have an ear anymore.
I had done plenty of research and I knew getting it dermal punched was the route I had to take, since I wanted it to be 8 gauge. In actuality, I liked the look of 6 gauge better, but at the time wasn't able to make the commitment to the slightly larger size, so I settled on 8. Unfortunately, it was here that I ran into a predicament. Where would I go about getting this done?
I called the shop where I had gotten my nipples pierced, as I had a very good experience there, to see if they did dermal punching. Much to my chagrin, they did not and I was left quite adrift. "What now?!" I thought. I was too committed to the idea of getting it done at this point and it would be impossible for me to simply let it go.
Living in New York City, a place that practically hosts a piercing and tattoo shop for every block in certain areas, one would think finding somebody to dermal punch my conch would be easy. Well, that's probably the case, however, I wasn't going to let just anybody do this work. This wasn't an earlobe piercing, hell, for any piercing I want to be able to trust my piercer and know that I'm going to get the best quality work I can. Even more simply, I want to know they're using sterile equipment and have a decent amount of experience. New York might have plenty of street shops, but they would not be seeing my business. But hey, next time I'm in the market for a lively case of Hep C or a crooked, festering piercing, maybe I'll reconsider.
It was then that I remembered reading about Brian Decker in an article on BME, and something gave me the impression that I remembered reading also that he worked at a shop on Canal Street. If that were the case, I would finally have my conch! So, I quickly looked into it and found that indeed, he did work in a shop on Canal Street and after looking more heavily at his work, was quite confident that this guy knew what he was doing. Just to be safe, I called Sacred Tattoo to make sure they did dermal punching and had punches available and the guy at the desk replied, "yeah" as if I had asked him "do you guys breath oxygen over there?" Confident with that response, in little over an hour I was walking through the door of the shop. And then I was introduced to Brian.
The feeling I was experiencing can only be compared to those girls you see in the front row of a Beatles concert, screaming and crying. Well, maybe not that extreme. But I definitely felt like I was meeting a celebrity. This was a person who's reputation far preceded him, acknowledged as one of the most talented practitioners in the body modification community for his intricate surface piercing work, scarification, and implanting. There was nobody I would rather have punch my conch.
When I told him that I wanted to go with 8 gauge, he said he generally punches and then stretches up one size in order to put some pressure on the wound to keep it from bleeding like a stuck pig. 6 gauge sounded huge to me, but again, that was the size I truly wanted, so I was all for it. Brian got all his supplies ready while I stood shivering in anticipation, paging through his portfolio just to give me something to do to ease my nerves.
Soon enough we were underway. Getting dermal punched is a very different feeling from piercing. Getting my nipples pierced was a very precise, local pain, whereas I felt the pain of the punch throughout my entire ear and just felt this incredible pressure at the spot of the punch. However, it was not until my ear suddenly filled with what felt like warm water that I knew the punch was through. Blood. I knew this thing was going to bleed, but holy crap, blood. It was an interesting, and pretty intense experience as he was pushing the punch through, but after that much of the pain faded to a dull throbbing.
I remember it now as if it happened all in slow motion, and indeed, at the time it felt like it was never going to end as my head pounded with me gritting my teeth, my ear feeling like it was ablaze. However, it's this element, the pain involved, that I've always felt was so integral to the entire piercing experience. If you want something that's this permanent (even a piercing leaves a scar if you take it out eventually), and hopefully important to you, you've got to earn it somehow. In the case of most of my piercings, and especially my inner conch, the piercing itself, aside from looking cool, has been a learning experience of some kind and I feel that anything truly worth learning takes effort and dedication on the part of the person learning. The raw pain felt during piercing is like a few coins in the coffer of worldliness in exchange for the wisdom you'll hopefully receive in the end.
While it was awesome getting my conch punched, Brian himself greatly contributed to making it such a good experience. We talked throughout the duration of the procedure, and even discovered that we were both originally from the same area of Connecticut. On top of being very well informed and experienced, Brian is incredibly friendly and easy to talk to. He made the entire experience entirely enjoyable.
I opted to wear a glass plug in my conch as it healed, in order to put the least amount of pressure on it and because the chances of having an adverse reaction to it was pretty low. I admired my new conch piercing and how the plug reflected the light and was wholeheartedly satisfied. I was psyched, or maybe that was just me misinterpreting how fucking hot my ear felt.
Getting home I was in a complete daze, with my ear still bleeding slightly and throbbing in tune to the noise of the city. Thankfully, I do not drive, so getting home consisted of me sitting on a subway for 40 minutes with my head reeling from the entire affair. Suffice it to say, I made it home alright, and with a beautiful new piercing to boot.
Time passed and my conch was healing wonderfully. After 2 weeks or so, it was rarely sore unless I accidentally slept on it and excreted a minimal amount of lymph. Unfortunately, complications arose.
My college was closed for the Easter holiday and I went home to celebrate with my family. Sadly, this entailed taking out my plug because one of my mom's rules about piercing is that my grandfather cannot know that I have anything pierced. However, it had been almost two months since I got my conch punched, so I was sure I would be able to easily take the plug out for a few hours and then reinsert it once my grandfather left.
The plug came out with no difficulty and no pain. I stared into the mirror for several minutes, marveling how I could see light through the other side of my ear. After dinner I quickly rushed to the bathroom in order to put my plug back in. For several minutes I struggled with no success, so I got another mirror in order to see the back of my ear. For several more minutes I struggled to no avail, now with my conch feeling moderately sore and slightly leaking blood. "Fuck," I mumbled through my teeth. "Fuck, fuck fuck." My hands were shaking and I was starting to sweat through the armpits in my shirt. I had made a horrible, horrible mistake.
After ten minutes I decided to put the plug in a plastic bag and give up, as I did not want to do anymore damage. I would be returning to school the next day and would be able to go back to Sacred to see Brian about it when they reopened on Tuesday. However, the time from then to Tuesday seemed like a small eternity and I was thoroughly depressed about my situation.
I slowly walked up the stairs and sulked into my room, where I collapsed on my bed and stared at the wall blankly, feeling utterly heartbroken. I knew in the end things would probably work out fine, but the prospect of being without my conch piercing for two days, that I had possibly done some harm to it, was killing me. I cannot adequately describe the feeling of complete loss that had settled into my chest and stomach, but it was at that moment that I truly understood what I had gotten myself into with this body modification business.
It was about more than knowing a lot about body modification. It was about more than visiting BME everyday. It was about more than liking the way piercings and tattoos look, and it was about more than wanting piercings and tattoos for myself. It was about letting these things become a part of you, become such an integral part of you that you simply cannot be without them. Lying there in my bed, with my ear feeling empty, it was almost as if I had lost a finger. I didn't get this conch piercing two months ago, it was like it had always been a part of me and I could not imagine myself without it even though I was lying there now with a gaping, unfulfilled hole in my ear.
Frankly, I was in love with that piercing and at that particular moment, I was heartbroken at its loss.
Of course, things worked out well enough, and Brian was able get the plug back in with the use of a taper although the intense pain I was greeted with during the stretch back up was a nice reminder to me of why I shouldn't have been so careless as to remove the jewelry only two months after getting it pierced. It's been months since then and my conch is doing quite well, though I think I'll give it another month or so before I put a ring in it just to make sure it's good and settled. After its near-loss I've looked at my conch with even more pride and affection than before and am truly thankful for it. I love it, even though many people I encounter are either repulsed by the idea of having to get a piece of my ear punched out or just think it was a big mistake on my part, I am comforted by the facts that they're both wrong and that their ears don't look nearly as cool as mine.