A Decorated Body
It is 1995, and I am 14 years old.
I’m sitting at the dining table with Cousin in one of my uncle’s homes. I whisper a confession.
When I grow up, I am going to be tattooed.
Cousin’s eyes became saucers. She excuses herself to report me to her mother, my aunt. Cousin is scared I am going to go to hell and needs to be soothed. I am scolded for saying things to confuse and hurt feelings; reprimanded for dreaming aloud about an adulthood of bodily integrity. The worst thing to be is a stumbling block, and I know better.
I am commanded to repent this sin against Cousin.
From the Tips of the Toes,
<br/>other told little sister a tale, and sketched the characters.
When unicorns jump into the ocean, they become narwhals; and if the narwhals surface, they are unicorns again.
On the right foot is Norbert the Narwhal, on the left, Nantucket the Unicorn; my “feet friends”. When I visit the beach, I dip the feet into the ocean, left-to-right-to-left-to-right, ritualizing the cycle from unicorn to narwhal. From life to life to the necessary and never-ending deaths.
This tattoo captures the innocence of childhood beliefs; a time of blind faith, when I may have trusted <br/>other to tell me the truth.
Around the Ankles,
Trying to be inconspicuous, at the base of a hot air balloon’s basket, a bat escapes into the night, surrounded by fireflies, with a stolen eyeball in its grip.
Up the Legs,
On the left calf, an Earth-bound astronaut in a hot air balloon made of the Universe, looks longingly toward a spaceship, attempting to beam him up. This tattoo expresses my relationship with <f/>other. He taught me to look toward the stars while limiting himself to black and white thinking. I tried showing him the way, from inside the spaceship, but he does not recognize how I have changed. And so <f/>other holds tight to his balloon, his beliefs, and dreams of adventure never far from reach.
Under my left knee is a black death moth in traditional styling; under my right, a colorful butterfly to contrast. Transformation unfolds my story. I am learning not to be scared of not being here any longer.
On my left thigh, a pinup-style tattoo; a portrait of my marriage.
I am dusting a bookshelf in a French maid costume with a white petticoat exposing a pink garter belt attached to black stockings. My hair is curled, and my lips a cherry red. I’m stuck in 1950; who wears high heels to clean? Hanging above my head is a framed portrait of my cat, Pixel; behind me is a round painting of pastel roses. I am smiling over my shoulder, toward my husband, who would be positioned on the couch with an Xbox controller in hand while I clean the house top to bottom, room to room. He’d eat snacks, drink whiskey, and lift his feet when I ran the vacuum. I am a perfectly obedient and appropriately sexy fantasy of a real wife. Displayed on the bookshelf, a Corona typewriter and a curated collection of books. Time and sun have blown out the letters and it is becoming difficult to read the titles. The HOLY BIBLE is in clear view, however, and stacked underneath is the book I am writing now 10 years later: I’M NOT WEARING ANY PANTS.
On my right calf, a grayscale garden skull made of flowers and leaves, with white accents, covers up the first hot air balloon tattoo. The first balloon was drawn by my ex-husband but he “hated looking at [the artist’s translation of his design]”.
When he complained, all I heard, that he could never understand, was “your calf is ugly, erase it”.
Expert eyes can make out the ghost balloon. Absence haunts.
Below the skull, a scene: three bats; one plucks an eyeball from a Mason jar, and two others approach in the distance. They fly across a night sky filled with fireflies who leave a glowing trail, a message, on the base of the ankle: “following intuition”. This is how I move forward, one step at a time. I do not require the eyes to see.
Beside the right knee, above the skull, is a ruby gem in the shape of a heart with a scripted bye. July birthdays; a farewell to friendship.
Watching from my right thigh, facing ahead and rich with color, an ornately framed portrait of an ambiguous figure sharing eyes and bending gender. A woman with her hair piled atop her head presents her femininity forward while a bearded man stares back at me, beckoning my masculinity. I mirror him and reflect her; we are one in the same. Who do you see when you see me?
A dove lands on my right hip with a twig in its grip, signaling peace and new growth.
and Up the Arms,
On the left wrist I am adorned with five hash marks. At once, a celebration and sentence, of five years of marriage.
Facing the five is the Phoenix rising from the ashes, smoke billowing toward the armpit. I do not look away from the messy parts and missteps. I embrace this life-death-life cycle because I want to change; because I want to change I embrace this life-death-life cycle.
I wear my heart on my (left) sleeve to memorialize my relationship with <m/>other; a yellow rose with red-tipped petals and faded green leaves, plucked from a bouquet. Forget-me-nots (the flower of my birth state) hug the rose. Black-lined geometric shapes and dew drops are layered atop the flowers, with paint splatters of blue, purple, red and yellow framing the chaotic pattern.
I color outside of the lines and she stays in. I openly express [to her], I do not want to hide as she hides from herself. When we are alone, I believe she can hear me and we sing in harmony. She is where I grew in creation, yet she cannot believe her own creativity. Am I not as stunning as you are beautiful, <m/>other?
On the right wrist, aunt Teresa’s script of Love, written inside the last birthday card I’ll ever receive from her. She has been my ancestral angel; an anchor to blood across time. I find her inside my grief. In death, she is patient with me, forgiving, and she is always with me. And so, in life, I can be patient with me, forgiving, and i /\m always with me. We must die to know i /\m.
Under Love, rests a pencil, a sharpener with shavings, and a Pink Pearl eraser. I write because I must. Beside the writing tools is a reminder to “be brave with your words”, and a rose compass without directional points—a perspective on presence. Wherever i /\m is where I’m meant to be. Where I am, is where i /\m is found.
Another five in morse code marking 10 years of marriage beside my right elbow pit.
The most popular tattoo is Pixel, my pixelated cat portrait, on my right bicep. She glares, and dares you to gettooclose.
Resting the right fist under the chin, the forearm exposes a request for a date to satiate with breakfast foods. Strawberries, blueberries and pineapple spill from a plate of syrupy pancakes stacked high, topped with a runny egg (the yoke often confused for butter), and stabbed with a fork. A knife hovers nearby, along with a syrup bottle branded BUY, a coffee cup identifying ME, and BRUNCH under the fruit. This tattoo inspires an activity.
I make eyes with someone. I tuck fist into chin, point to breakfast with left index finger, point to mouth, point back to tattoo and then point to person. It requires the skill of reading the eyes, which few have developed.
(I never use it. Turns out, I don’t care as much about dating as I thought I did.)
On the back of my right arm is a space- and Wizard-of-Oz-themed piece. There’s no place like home, but home isn’t Earth; “... my treasures are laid up, somewhere beyond the blue.”
Down the Head,
Behind the right ear, my handwriting; a word: “secrets”. Behind the left: “lies”.
Strangers tell me secrets and lovers tell me lies. The signal of a broken intimacy meter; the unfamiliar faces safer than the recognizable voices. Billy Joel was correct. I can ask for the truth but I’ll never believe you.
On the back of the neck, an eye with intricate detail and pops of color representing seven unblocked chakras. Creative flow opens me to consider new ideas.
I couldn’t locate a photo of me at age 14.
“wait ‘til you see her from the back-back-back-back-back…”
Across the Back,
In between my shoulder blades, my second tattoo is covered by an apple. Inside the apple, a delicate edg in my own penmanship hides. Underneath the apple, my married initials: eve. Divorce led me back to edg, but I will leave eve be. She has had enough. Nothing is her fault.
Circling the apple were once two sparrows, red and blue. The red remains the same but the blue has transformed into a crow–a callback to tattoo number one… “for sorrow, two for joy…”
The first tattoo was always going to be a band tattoo. The shooting star from Counting Crows’ second album Recovering the Satellites hovered above my jeans for 21 years before it was covered up with a nest holding three blue eggs–symbolic of the three ghosts in my work. A snake is coiled at the nest’s base, uninterested in consuming the unborn, and moves instead into the center of the back, defined by an upside-down green glowing triangle representing eternal love from the inside-out.
Toward the Heart,
In the center of the chest, between the breasts, an anatomical heart in soft black with an eyeball. Flowers grow from the vessels. When I see with the heart, I bloom.
The only husband I’ll ever have, Matthew, in script under the left breast, showcases his deletion from my life. Underneath his name are seven red dots. “In the margin”—on my ribs—is the hard copy editorial direction “stet”, a Latin word meaning “let it stand”. Editors use this markup when the original text should be kept and the suggested change, ignored. (I interpret my naked skin as original and the suggested change as Matthew, meaning pretend I didn’t get this tattoo.)
A stick ‘n’ poke honors a deep and instant friendship; a halved grapefruit is positioned on the lower abdomen, to the left of the belly button. Yonic and symbolic, she and I make life worth the squeeze.
Resting across the right cage of ribs, a rhinoceros skeleton is encircled by forget-me-nots. Did you know, despite the rhinoceros’ tough-looking exterior, they endure sensitive skin? Same.
& Everywhere in Between.
The filler that hugs the body and amplifies the curves, a floral carpet amid a black spiral that bees confuse for reality. From the shins to the backs of the thighs, up the left glute and blooming around the spine, a garden of wild flowers; chrysanthemums, zinnias, blue bonnets, and forget-me-nots. Bury me green, naked and three feet deep, return me to the wild so flowers can grow through the bones.
The black spiral represents illusion. You see me with eyes not mine and do not know me. The absence of tattoo twirls my skin and I give in to the unknown; the void of “self”.
Nothing matters.
I knew myself well at 14.
My family pressed the importance of walking the talk—living by the words you speak—because words create.
I might’ve said I’m sorry to my cousin in 1995, but I never repented of my tattoo desires. (I have, however, repented many apologies I didn’t mean.) I am far more concerned with the ways in which I have sinned against myself because I was duped into thinking anyone else’s beliefs trump my own.
At 44 years old, I am proud to live the truths of this decorated body; and I am strong enough to die by them, like the Jesus character in my family’s bible.
The truth is not a stumbling block, unless a lie has been constructed arou [you] nd.
I have been tattooed by many artists. There are two women I see often because of the level of trust and safety developed between us, while I am under the needle. They have seen me through many iterations of self; Joanne Slorach of The Hive Tattoo in Portland, Oregon, and Hannah Aitchison of The Curiosity Shop in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
