Self-Surgery

My TV/music-blaring neighbor and the thin walls between my apartment and that of said neighbor causes me to get a lot of use out of my ear plugs. This translates into wear and tear. At some point during the last night I suppose the tension line was crossed, and this morning my worst earplug-related fear manifested: half an earplug had broken off leaving the other half deep within my ear.

OK, that thing had to come out. Comparing the half I found in my bed with the full one I saw about half was still in there. I pulled out some tweezers and thought if I could get a hold of what was in there. After some effort, all I realized I was doing was further shredding what was in there, effectively pushing the “graspable” end back further into my ear canal.

All this mind you, was about 7am, and I was a little cranky about being up not to mind being half deaf. Could I live like this? In my frustration I contemplated it…give it a day, and see if it wasn’t bearable. I laid on the bed with my plugged ear facing down and, since gravity alone wasn’t helping, shook my head violently. All that did was give me a headache.

I thought about taking a shower in the hope of disintegrating the foam earplug, but I saw the potential pitfall of a soggy mass still lodging in my ear and now contributing to a case of pneumonia or at the least mold growing in my ear. Neither would be pleasant.

My girlfriend’s father is a surgeon involved with ears…he told me in the past every once in a while cockroaches crawl into people’s ears and become stuck. It was for certain true that I could have much worse things stuck in my ear.

I’m sure if I asked for advice my girlfriend would yell at me to go for medical attention. The problem with is that I don’t have medical insurance…but I do have a paper clip! (I had given up on the tweezers). Balancing a (reflective) mixing bowl on my shoulder, I tried to navigate into my canal, although that was impossible, because it wasn’t that the image I saw was the reverse but much more complicated because I was looking in the mirror’s reflection of the curved mixing bowl’s reflection. I knew then I would have to feel my way in. Keeping in mind was my 9th grade science teacher told me (“there’s no pain like popping your eardrum”) I proceeded carefully. Ohhh, I learned both how sensitive your ear canal is and how sharp a paperclip can be.

I remember when I first started to feel it come out…I was filled with a sense of hope. I took it slow; I didn’t want to get overly excited and botch this. Finally, it came out and I heard it the world in stereo again. All that excitement and it was just 7:15am.