I have a pimple that is causeing me a bit of discomfort.
Now that I am in the advanced elderly age of my 30's, I rarely get pimples any more. When once in a blue moon they erupt on my face they are usually so minor that I do not stand in front of the mirror fretting and fearing that it will ruin my hot date. Not that I have had any hot dates as of late. However, it seems that lately when I do get one they are usually either painful or of incredible inconvenience.
A few months ago I had a pimple on the inside of my nose. It was quite painful and I was happy when it finally died and it's ghost wafted away to pimple purgatory. I thought it simply did not get much worse than that, but I was wrong, for I had yet to experience the inner butt cheeks pimple.
I first noticed this thing about a week ago when I was doing my business that normally leads my fingers in-between my butt cheeks. It started out as a small lump, and for a while I was horrified that I might have picked up some horrid butt-disease from off the porta-potty toilet seat from the Suwannee spring fest. With a couple hundred hippies using the same shitter, the possibilities were not that remote. However, it's growth began to accelerate that special ways that only zits do, and I had to wait for it to run it's course.
Last night I decided to take a hot bath in hopes of getting it to swell and burst. When I went to bed that night I put some Neosporin on it. I do not have any zit cream, but I feel my logic is sound. Zits are caused by bacterial, and Neosporin kills bacteria. I had hoped it would shrivel up sometime during the night but when I woke up this morning it had swelled to a volcanic size and was itching to be popped. It was also incredibly painful. When I walk I can feel it slide against my other cheek causing sharp spasms of a pinpoint of pain to erupt from my nether regions.
Finally I arranged myself in my bathroom in a hideously undignified position with my ass pointed towards my mirror and my head craning over my shoulder as I reached around and had a firm grip of the offending zit between my thump and forefinger. Taking a deep breath I gritted my teeth....and squeeeezed.
The pain was horrible. Oh I have had worse pains in my life, but never fixated in such a sensitive place. Tears began to steam from my eyes and after a few moments I was rewarded with a small pop (felt, not heard) and I'll spare everyone the details of what came out. Regardless, I believe the lifespan of that pimple had reached it's apex and is now on the decline.
The only problem now is the damn thing still hurts. Not a lot, but it is in such a position that when I sit down it bears the full brunt of my weight. I feel like I need one of those little inflatable donuts that hemorrhoid sufferers and prison rape victims use to sit down. When I walk it is with a slow careful giant to make sure there is not too much friction going on. I never knew anything as simple as a pimple could cause so much discomfort.
And thus is the pain I am currently suffering. However it comforts me that by reading this, you have suffered a little bit yourself.
2026 Update
Dialing the infernal machine back to April 2007, where Ed's greatest fear is a zit on his inner cheek.
Ah, 2007, a simpler time when a man could document an inner-buttocks pimple for the world and call it a blog post. The internet has changed, Ed. Back then, this was a confessional monologue; now it would be a TikTok slideshow with a sponsored link for a pore vacuum. You used Neosporin and logic, which I respect, but modern medicine has since given us overpriced pimple patches that claim to draw out impurities while charging you a subscription fee. Also, your advanced elderly age of 30s — nowadays people hit 30 and still post photos of their avocado toast; youth is a marketing demographic, not a biological reality. And those festival porta-potties? They haven't improved; they just have QR codes on the door for a sanitation survey. You had the right instinct: mirror, finger, squeeze. But in 2026 we can't even admit we do that without a wellness journey hashtag. At least you had the decency to spare the details. I appreciate the pain you caused me, actually. It's the closest thing to empathy I've felt all century.
“2007 Ed, in that hideously undignified position, did you have a moment of clarity about what you were doing with your life, or was the pain too distracting to think?” — Beelzebubba the Third
2007 Ed: Well, Beelzebubba, I wish I could say the universe opened up and showed me the grand meaning of it all, but no. The only clarity I had was that this is where my life had landed me—bent over in a bathroom, eyeing my own backside in a mirror, praying I didn’t slip and fall and end up on the news. The pain was distracting, sure, but there was a tiny moment of pure, dumb understanding: this is what being a grown man means. Not wisdom, not grace. Just you and a pimple and a tube of Neosporin, negotiating with gravity. It’s humbling, really. I think I learned something, but I can’t remember what through the throbbing. Mostly I just wanted a donut to sit on. Take that, foul zit.
