An Ode and a Farewell to my Nose Ring.

Hi, friends! I hope that you had a good week, I’ve been so dreadfully sick as of late, but I’m finally starting to feel somewhat better.

I’ve been contemplating removing my nose ring for quite some time, but I finally did it yesterday. I got it pierced when I was seventeen, so I’ve had it done for about four years now. My style at the time was also quite different. I had jet-black hair with straight-across bangs. It was certainly more edgy than it is now. Nowadays, I seem to favor a more classic style, well, when I decide to dress up anyhow. Otherwise it consists of fairly baggy “Life is Good” shirts.

I was beginning to feel as though I had sort of outgrown my nose ring.

So, yesterday. I’m sitting at my desk, fidgeting with my nose ring. Last weekend Bobby and I were bound and determined to get that thing out of my nose, but try as we might, we just couldn’t do it! And then yesterday, funnily enough, while I was just absentmindedly playing with it, the ball on it twisted off and I was able to easily take it off. My nose was only a tad red from the ordeal.

And maybe it’s because I’m a writer, or maybe it’s because I’m extra sensitive, but I sort of feel as though this could be a metaphor for me leaving my childhood. Which makes me sort of sad, but is also kind of exciting. I really am getting older and I suppose it’s not something that I think of too often. I mean, I’m almost on my last year of college, I’m engaged, and I’m going to be getting married this September.

I don’t know if spunky seventeen year old Mattie would believe any of this. I was so angsty and cynical back then.It’s so silly how emotional this nose ring has me, but in a way, it’s a measure of time, a measure of my growth as a person.

And I want to take a  moment to mention that I’m not turning up my nose (ha) at nose rings or anything of the like. I think that it is so important for us all to express ourselves, however that may be. I just think that I’m so different of a person than I was at seventeen that my nose ring doesn’t suit me anymore.

I remember being seventeen. It wasn’t really that long ago, but it feels that way. I remember feeling like I had to like unique things or dress differently than everyone else because I wasn’t “enough” if I was just being me. I felt I wasn’t interesting enough and I wasn’t pretty enough, or anything. I just wasn’t “enough”. Which is such a sad thing and a bad thing for someone to feel. And there are days where  I’m not happy with myself, but I am so glad that I don’t feel like I have to put on a costume to use as a distraction, to distract people from an insecure teenager. Getting rid of my nose ring, as silly as it may seem, was the last piece of that costume that I’ve stripped away.

We’re allowed to grow, it’s only natural that we don’t like the same things forever. It’s what I find so wonderful in life, that we will exist as so many people in our lifetime. It makes me excited to think of all the people that I will be!

Thank you so much for reading this, friends! I hope y’all have a great weekend!

XOXO,

Mattie Mae