The Best Way For an Adult to Get Pierced is Not At All

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Love, Frank has returned as a weekly style advice column tackling your hard-hitting fashion issues and addressing a different fashion glitch each week. Submit a query here.

Hi Frank,

All of a sudden, everyone seems to have cute piercings—ear, nose, you name it. New York Magazine even put a piercer in their "Best of New York" issue.

I'm intrigued but nervous. What's the best way for an adult with an office job to partake without looking like she just escaped the mall Piercing Pagoda?

Sincerely,
Needling Around

Dearest Needling,

I hate to be a killjoy here—but just don't.

You're an adult with an office job. You've made it into your 20s, your 30s, maybe even your 40s. And you made it without mutilating your face. Why now?

I should hope your rebellious phase is long past. Along with any teen angst. Likewise any desire to shock your parents; or identify with some musician whose photos you ripped out of magazines and taped to your walls circa age 15.

It seems silly to me. What's the statement you're trying to make? If you want something that is tasteful and professionally appropriate, something that just blends in—how about you just don't put a hole in your face? How about you simply stick to earrings? Those are nice.

You know how our parents—and I'm certainly generalizing here, but hear me out—aren't gratuitously pierced and tattooed? And how all of us (I'm not, but our generation) are unapologetically pierced and tattooed to the point that it's no longer edgy or rebellious or even really cool—even though it totally scandalized our parents when we (not me) came home with nose rings and tattoos of butterflies?

Now, think about your kids, and, once they're teenagers, how lame they're going to think their old, out-of-touch parents are. And how gross they're going to think their parents' saggy nose holes and stretched out tattoos are. They aren't going to want the holes or the ink. They're going to think how embarrassing their mothers and dads are.

Now, if you're still listening to Buckcherry or Crazy Town then I can't help you. Please disregard everything I've said and go for it. What do I care?

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