On the Septum and California

I was 20 when I had my septum pierced. It was 2017. I was on a gap year that soon extended to three. I worked on a trial crew cutting fallen trees with a chainsaw and making stone stair cases. I lived in Santa Cruz with 10-20 people in one house. Eventually I was fed up with the bunk beds and slept in a tent in the backyard. The privacy was nice. But my tent house betrayed me when all my stuff was stolen by homeless people and I began to suffer Psychosis from my lack of clothing options.

The septum in made of cartilage like a shark. Meaning mine will never heal. I shed a single tear when they put the needle through, but I wouldn’t call it painful.

In Santa Cruz everyone is homeless. I often had dreams of them coming to my tent and lifting me into the San Lorenzo River. The river is disgusting, it’s filled with shit and needles and mud. It makes the beach dirty as well. I only smoked weed in “Purple Berry” Backwoods. I found the fact that the guts were wrapped in an entire tobacco leaf charming. You could even see the veins. I usually bought weed from an old woman who road around Ocean Drive. We knew this hippie girl that was convinced that holding your pee was extremely bad for you. So whenever she had to go, she went. But she was so sweet and so beautiful that no one gave a shit. At the time I didn’t know any men with a septum piercing. It was cool for a while. It marked me as other.

The Santa Cruz Coastline is held together by an invasive succulent called “Ice Plant”. It casts a strong net which keeps the rocks from slipping into the ocean.

For two weeks I was in love with a Mexican woman from Connecticut. I blew it immediately by sleeping with a Norwegian woman with a chronic pain disease. She came to my tent and scratched.

“What do you want?”

She giggled.

It turns out her only reprieve from pain was when she was having sex.

A fascist named Donald Trump was in office. Which meant everyone had to get as many shitty tattoos and piercings as possible. When I woke up and looked around I realized I wasn’t the only man with a septum piercing anymore. Normal people had them now. Lame people had them. But I was stubborn. I felt like I would be a sellout if I removed it.

The meaning of objects are negotiated.

The septum that once marked me as other. Now marked me as “leftist” “queer” or something much much worse.

Out of style.

I have to stuff my nose ring up everyday because I work with children and I don’t want to be a bad influence, or fired.

So I am removing it.

Because the most punk thing you can be is yourself.