TreeHouseView

My ears stick out. If there is one part of me, one thing I could fix, change, alter, make better on my body–a feature that I could have asked to have be different upon birth, it would have to be this one. At some point in my life, if a Genie had emerged from a bottle and granted me Three Wishes, odds are strongly in favor that one wish would have been used up on my ears.

No memory of when it was that I started to see it…was it a mirrored reflection gazing back at me, or a photo of myself where I saw it? It wasn’t due to someone else, to my recollection. Thankfully, no one has ever made fun of my sticky-outy ears, at least not since I was old enough to start covering them up (at least not within earshot of me) but that is a million percent why I cover them up. So no one can judge me for my less than acceptable, less than “perfect” visage.

How vain. How terribly shallow and immature of me to have let this feeling control me for most of my life. I didn’t wear my hair in certain styles as a teenager and younger adult who played sports and was involved in lots of activities where different hair-do’s would have been helpful strictly because it would show my ears. I suffered through years of not wearing my hair up off my neck in a ponytail or any kind of hairdo that would make me less hot and sweaty because I was worried about my damn ears.

I didn’t talk about it with hardly anyone. My best friend might have known, but my penchant for keeping things private probably won out here. I tend to think if things aren’t talked about, they’ll eventually go away…hello toxic trait #739.

Body image issues control so many people and I’m not immune. It’s just that my main one is a bit different than most of the ones my friends were/are worried about. Of course I have always had insecurities about other parts of my body, but I know that if my butt is getting big, I can DO something about it. My sticky-outy ears are more out of my immediate control.

Plastic surgery would be something that would fix them, but I haven’t really seriously considered that option. Certainly during the teenage years when I was the most insecure about my ears, surgery would never have been an option. I never got to the point where I tried taping them or anything, as I would have been worried about whatever adhesive I would have used not lasting and the threat of a wardrobe malfunction equivalent to Janet Jackson’s Superbowl Nip Slip would have prevented me from ever leaving my house.

As as adult, at some point I started to feel more comfortable and realized that having ears that weren’t flat to my head wasn’t the worst thing in the world, and wearing my hair up wouldn’t scare small children into submission. If you see me out in public with my hair up, or even in a hat, best believe there will be some selectively placed strands of hair around my face that are designed to take emphasis off, you guessed it, my ears. Fairly ridiculous, as it probably doesn’t hide a damn thing but somehow it makes me feel okay about it.

At home, with my family whom I’m comfortable being a complete hag around, I will wear all of my hair up off my face and neck with my ears waving their Dumbo-esque selves in all their glory and I’ll catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror from time to time and think, “that’s not so bad–what have I been so worried about all of these years?”

Or I’ll catch a glimpse and be right back as a 16 year old trying her damndest to turn back the hands of time as she stares in that mirror, scissors in hand, wisps of blonde hair on the bathroom counter and tears beginning to roll down her blotchy red cheeks as she realizes what she just did.

That mistake scarred me for life–I never gave myself another haircut. EVER. I had tried to cut “slithers” on the sides of my face that would sort of serve to camouflage the hideous flappers on my head and instead I made the error most people with zero hair cutting experience make. I just cut a straight chunk of hair off either side and was left with…well, sideburns?

And then to really add salt to the wound, my mother thought taking me to a hairdresser to get a perm would solve the problem, because it was the 80s and who didn’t want a perm? I did not and It turned those sideburns into baby-bouffant bushels on either side of my head and I spent the rest of my sophomore year of high school hyper-fixating on my hair rather than my ears.

I have a picture from a Sadie Hawkins or Gingham Gallop dance that same year, one where the girls ask the boys (so progressive!) and my ear muffs are on full display, as well as my giant smile because the boy I was with was one of my favorites. But my ears are nowhere in sight!