My wacky ear problem is long gone but my tinnitus remains, as it has pretty much continuously since 1995.
I recall two particularly good moments over the past nine years: one, in the late ’90s, before the Matthew Sweet concert that pushed the tinnitus farther into permanency, when I was taking the bus and walking to work every day instead of using the PATH train, and the ringing quieted down tremendously; and two, during the evil diplacusis phase, when I had a deep tissue massage on my neck, shoulders and chest, and for 24 hours I literally had no ringing in my ears. I unwisely chalked that up as an anomaly, didn’t return to the spa where I got the massage, and haven’t experienced that since.
This issue comes about because of a friend’s encounter with Bob Mould, who has a nasty case of tinnitus himself.
From the same page, the lyrics to U2’s “Staring at the Sun,” which supposedly chronicles Bono’s encounters with tinnitus:
There’s an insect in your ear
If you scratch it won’t disappear
Its gonna itch and burn and sting
You wanna see what the scratching brings…
Waves that leave me out of reach
Breaking on your back like a beach
Will we ever live in peace?