Day 66: Today is a Good Day to Dye

I am a big talker. I like to talk about or plan out what I would like to do. I will volunteer for this charity, I will learn to play this instrument, I will finally finish studying French. I talk a big game, but find that in the end, I suck on the follow through. Today I got my first tattoo. It is not something I necessarily had not planned on, I knew the design and where I wanted it, but I’ve wanted one for 20 years so to suddenly decide today was the day took even me by surprise. So why do we do that? What makes one day a good day for going through with something we’ve long held at bay compared to any other day when it may simply be on your horizon, but not your immediate future? Why, after 20 years was today the day I decided to forever change my body?

I suppose I could ask why not today, but that’s just philosophical posturing. I have never actually been scared of getting a tattoo for the pain factor, but I have spent a great deal of time ruminating over the implication of putting something on my body that is permanent and that speaks about me to the world. For one thing, I don’t have much difficulty expressing myself on my own. If I want to speak I just open my big mouth and have at it. A tattoo, however, speaks in a very condensed form. You cannot possibly write the story you want your tattoo tell in words, well I suppose you could try, but depending on your size you’d likely run out of room before you ran out story. No, a tattoo needs to tell the story in a more metaphysical way.

Some people get tattoos of things they just like the look of. I think they are dumbasses for doing so, but who am I to judge? Well, of course I’m going to judge, but that’s not the point. Those people choose a design of something that is pretty, or badass, or emblematic and that does speak to who they are as a person. Maybe you really did want that ridiculous fairy tattoo on the inside of your wrist. While I’m going to have to judge for it, I also recognize that it says something significant about you are as a person. That alone, is reason enough to respect the choice I suppose. For me, the tattoo and the placement had to speak more about my life philosophy, because while I think one thing is pretty one day that can change. Who I am as a person, the way that I choose to live my life, after 36 years I can promise that is not going to change.

My tattoo is meant to say something about who I am, and that is a choice I made. I want it to reflect a part of me and there is no way I could live with something the rest of my life that didn’t. I’m just not a small talk or pretty tattoo kind of girl. So I woke this morning and after telling myself for years that I will one day get a tattoo I decided that today is one day and tomorrow would be one day too many. The funny thing is, this event that I had built up in my mind was simply another hour of work for some guy at a tattoo shop. He didn’t even ask what my Chinese lettering meant. He did the work, explained how to care for it, and sent me on my way. It seemed a bit anti-climatic at the time, but now it feels just the way it should have been.

I made a big enough deal out of this tattoo thing in my own mind. I wrestled with where and what and then for years waited on the when. I didn’t go with a bunch of friends, I didn’t even tell anyone I was doing it. I just went and got it done. In less than an hour I am forever changed and no one even knew. Sometimes change is about the inside and while the way we appear to the world might reflect our changing attitudes or beliefs, the reality is all the tattoos in the world will not reflect what my motivation is. I am on a journey. This crazy ride to find myself and to be truthful to that fucked up girl is taking me to some places I didn’t even know I was ready for, and to still others for which I’ve been waiting a lifetime. So maybe you won’t know that my tattoo is about embracing my life philosophy, about acting rather than talking, and experiencing rather than wishing. All you know is that Ame got inked. Quite honestly, I think that’s really the point anyway. I’m sick of talking about the person I want to be, instead I’m just going to be, just let myself unfold.