At A Glance
Author	Pygmy
Contact	[email protected]
IAM	MacabreSunshine
When	N/A

mod�i�fy: To be or become modified; change.

I've reached a point in my life where I'm starting to question my identity. It seems that I'm torn by two different people. One wants to be a good girl, and do exactly what her parents/employers say, who wants to be liked, loved, and happy, and then another one wants to live her life the way she feels she can only be truly happy, modified. But as I grow older and more people criticize me for my love of body modification I began to think maybe this isn't the life for me. It's a very sad thing having to live your life feeling incomplete because society isn't ready for the world of modification. They say its mutilation, horrible, disgusting. I say it's beautiful, self expression, happiness. But it doesn't matter how much I voice my opinions, how much I stress to get my point across, open-mindedness comes around a lot less than I could ever hope for.

So I think to myself, maybe I should take out my piercings, cover up my tattoos, and become another drone in society without much to designate me as a unique and happy human being. No, society says uniqueness comes from your brain, and your personality, not your ink. What if I give in? I become a 'normal' human being like the majority of society and then more jobs will open up to me, more people will warm up to me, certainly I'll be happy with a stable job and more acquaintances.... Right?

Wrong.

I can't tell you how much it hurts me to be called a freak, I'm a human being, just like everyone else, and no matter how many holes I have in my face or how much ink I have inserted into my skin I'm still a decent human being with good morals. I feel the only way I can truly feel happy and content with my self-image is to be modified. This is the way I am, I can't change that. I don't know why I feel this lack of confidence towards my self image, my body just doesn't satisfy me, and I know I'm going in the right direction when I get new tattoos or piercings because a part of me knows I look beautiful this way, no matter what the majority of society thinks. Every time I have to take a piercing out or cover up my tattoos I feel like an appendage has been torn away from me, like a little piece of me is missing. I don't want to go through life that way, I'll be miserable.

But then if I choose to take the path to the future where I can be me, then I ostracize myself. It's harder to get a good job and it's harder to make good first impressions with people who have a sour spot for piercings. So maybe it seems that I can never be happy with my choices. I'll always end up being untrue to myself in one way or the other, and really who wants that? Sometimes our choices in life end up being a lot less than we'd hoped for. And who wants to live in regret?

So fuck the majority of close-mindedness. People can't always be like everyone else, the world would be so boring that way. And although a lot of people with modification has had their parents support through their whole 'phase' will realize that it isn't a phase, if people aren't content with how the world sees them they will try to make that image better, if not to please others than definitely to please their own self image. And really that's what body modification is all about, to modify your body to suit your ideal body image, to love your body even more that you did before. Because in the end aren't we all fighting to accomplish the same thing? Whether we lift weights, use plastic surgery, makeup or piercings to make ourselves more pleasing to the eye, we are really all trying to make ourselves happy with ourselves, and that's all that counts.... Isn't it?

I may not know much about the outside world, but I know a lot about myself and I cannot keep hiding my passion from society. Someday it's bound to come out, I just don't think that my small rural community will be able to appreciate my ideals as much as I do... I'm not asking to legalize heroin here, I'm just asking for a little acceptance from the rest of the world.

So how do you feel about this? Do you share my ideals or do you think I just don't know what I'm talking about? Am I just another ignorant teenager that needs to grow up?
Maybe I do.