Do your ears hang low?

Every night, as I lay my head on my pillow, I pass my hand under my earlobe to smooth it out. It’s uncomfortable otherwise. As I do it, the words to a children’s song flash through my head, a soundtrack to the motion.

You might know it: “Do your ears hang low? Do they wobble to and fro? Can you tie ’em in a knot? Can you tie ’em in a bow?” I gather it is probably a couple centuries old, with rather bawdy lyrics originally, as it was a soldier’s marching song, sanitised over the years. Any­way, those are the words that have popped unbidden into my head as I flatten my ears to sleep. It was only recently that I became conscious of this habitual ritual and how long it had been going on.



At first I thought it was because I am hyper sensitive to things like clumped-up cloth, so I need my sheets and my pillows to be smoothed out, no creases. I sleep on my side, any side, and because of my spinal idiosyncrasies, I use several pillows, so I am always adjusting them during the night. I suppose I toss and turn a lot, and it can be tiresome, because every fidget ­requires a renewed set of fixing.

Then I wondered if everyone has to smooth out their earlobes. That set me off. My earlobes are not small—they’re not particularly large either, but they are detached from my face at the base.

It turns out that there are basically two types of earlobes: attached and unattached. The attached ones are directly connected to the side of the face, and the unattached ones hang free. Mine, being unattached, can sort of fold up when I lie down.

Naturally, curious me went searching to find out more. What purpose does an earlobe serve? Why do people have different types. What determines the shape of the ear itself? Have you ever wondered? I wouldn’t be surprised if you haven’t; it’s not exactly a source of concern.

It doesn’t appear that earlobes have any particular biological function. They carry a hearty blood supply that can serve to keep the ears warm, and they are recognised as an erogenous zone for some. They offer some aesthetic appeal: a space for earrings, and in some cultures they are actively enlarged with stretching techniques.

Even ear piercings have increased in size, stretching the holes to such an extent that I find it disturbing to watch without an internal wince (as I feel with piercings on delicate parts of the anatomy). Earlobe distinctions are genetic. I have read a couple of articles that suggest free earlobes are the most common, and it set me off on another, hopelessly distracting quest.

I’ve become annoyingly focused on people’s ears. I go out to run errands, and someone’s ear will attract my attention. Might be large, or heavily adorned, something eye-catching, and suddenly I can’t stop looking at ears.

It happens often now when I am watching a film, or the news, or worse, cricket. I am mortified by how many players’ ears I know; how many actors I can identify by their hearing appendages. When I was writing the biography of Sir Frank Worrell, I described his ears as sticking out like teacup handles when he was a youngster—I suppose the ear attraction goes back for some time.

My armchair scrutiny has led me to believe that the distinctions seem arbitrary. People do have differently shaped ears overall; some are tiny things, some huge, some flattened close to the face, others almost perpendicular; they are often subtle ­variations. I wonder if it’s akin to ­fingerprints? I’ve noticed that race doesn’t seem to be a factor.

I also get the impression that the distribution of free and attached lobes seems rather even. I don’t know what to make of all this, except that it has been one of my quirky escapades into something that is innocuous and not at all injurious to my state of mind. I’d wanted to write about this for some time but hesitated because it seemed such an irrelevant foray into light trivia.

But then it hit me—we are surrounded so relentlessly by so much that is grim and nasty and downright foreboding, that it is hard for us to keep our spirits up. I’ve been watching many people cracking under the pressure. Friends are snapping at each other over issues that are so petty that ordinarily they would dismiss them in no time.

Relationships require effort; there are rough patches and moody outbursts. I find it alarming to witness how brittle everything has become, and I surmise it is because people are wilting under the strain. On a general scale, we are bombarded by distressing news of politics, genocidal wars, murders and catastrophes of global proportions.

On the home front, the crimes and calamities are no less horrific. Surely, we know that humankind’s inhumanity is at the heart of it, and it must leave us in a collective state of depression. Jumping into the earlobes was my way of reminding myself that it’s okay to switch off from the gloom.

It’s not such a bad thing to fall asleep wondering if my ears hang low; it could be much worse. We need a break sometimes; you know? —Vaneisa Baksh is an editor, writer and cricket historian. E-mail: vaneisabaksh@gmail.

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