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Don’t
Bet on It
Why Janet Jackson isn’t on my Christmas card list
by Kent Lewis
I
love betting, probably because I rarely lose. My confidence bit
me in the ass, however, or in the nipple, as the case may be, Super
Bowl Sunday, when I made a bet with my fiancée that the New England
Patriots would beat the spread. Unfortunately, we hadn't agreed
on the prize going into halftime, and when Janet exposed her breast,
I had an epiphany: The loser should pierce his/her nipple! I figured
my fiancée probably wouldn't go through with it, and if she did,
it might be kinda cool. It never occurred to me that it might be
my nipple that ended up getting its own decoration.
As those of you who watched the Super Bowl know, I lost the bet. The damn Pats won but not by enough to save my teat. I'm not one for body mutilation, but I did survive an ear piercing in college. Still, a stud through the earlobe isn't exactly comparable to piercing an extremely sensitive body part.
The weekend visit to the body piercing shop in Southeast Portland was nearly two weeks in the making, as I was doing my best to get out of the bet. My fiancée threatened the loss of various amenities like cooking and a place to sleep if I weaseled out. She even went as far as to conduct some research to find the best piercing shop, just to be helpful. In the end, there was no saving my hairy little button: It would have to get what was coming to it.
My stomach started to churn the moment I entered Captain Jack's. The wall was decorated with photos of tattoos and piercings and various trade paraphernalia. Bernard greeted us from behind a glass case with no less than 25 pieces of flair on his face. After communicating my "wish" to Bernard, I was given an album filled with a variety of nipples adorned with studs, hoops and bars. I found myself spending more time analyzing the nipples than the piercings and begrudgingly selected a small silver loop for myself.
The next major decision I had to make was which nipple. My fiancée and I were unable to decide, so we broke the deadlock with the always-reliable eenie meenie miney moe. The right one lost, or won, depending on how you look at it. While we waited for my turn in the hot seat, we watched the 15-year-old girl ahead of us get her bellybutton pierced. She was tougher me, which made me just a bit concerned. It also made me think about my baby daughter: Would she ever find herself in such a situation after seeing my skewered nipple? Hopefully she would have a better bookie.
The only anesthetic the shop offered me while I waited was a Pabst Blue Ribbon. I took two. When my name was called, it felt briefly like I was getting a haircut - that is until I saw the piercing gun. I pretended like I'd been here many times before, that this was my twentieth piercing. I tried to make small talk with gun-toting Carissa:
"Can you just take a little off the top?"
"Don't you think the snake tattoo will look good on my willy?"
"Is that thing loaded?"
"I want to make it absolutely clear that I'm NOT getting another Prince Albert."
"Whatever you do, don't pierce the right nipple; I'm saving that for my birthday."
And so forth. Carissa was unfazed by my witty banter. She asked me to take off my shirt and finish my beer. It was the zero hour and I realized there was no turning back. I was going to go through with it. My life was going to be forever changed. I was going to have to be careful taking off shirts and extremely dexterous with the washcloth. I'd have to remember to take out the ring before long runs and bouts of oil wrestling. As the piercing gun approached my nipple, I closed my eyes, squeezed the armrests and thought about ways to get even with the Patriots and Janet Jackson for getting me into this mess.
Beyond an initial twinge of pain, the piercing process wasn't too bad. Once the stud was inserted, the sharp pains were replaced by a dull ache. For the first day or so, my fiancée couldn't help staring at it and wanted to play with it all the time. Beyond the heckling, I had trouble sleeping on my stomach for a few nights, but I soon got used to it. The only significant change to my life was my inability to wear tighter shirts without looking like a robot. After two months of hiding my dirty little secret, I decided to abandon it in my drawer next to my diamond stud earring from college. I'm happy to be able to say I've been there and pierced that. Next time, I'll go with that snake tattoo.
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