A Tour of My Tattoos

I promised to tell you about my tattoos…all of them are small and most have some meaning…

#1 – I have a little bird carrying a red flower on my stomach. It is about two and a half inches to the right and below my belly button. I got this in high school after a girl I knew pretty well got shot when a bar fight spilled out onto a street and into the coffee shop she was in. She was a completely pure soul, and I never wanted to forget her, or the way that made me want to move as far away as possible.

#2 – I have Japanese characters on my left shoulder blade that say “From perseverance through adversity comes strength.” I got this one at the beginning of my sophomore year after the final, final, final end of a long and sometimes tortured connection with High School Boyfriend. That story is gonna take me like a month of posts to tell, and it might be a while before I get to it.

I actually forgot exactly what this said at one point…lol…and had to have The Body’s father translate it again for me exactly. I knew the gist of it, but the exact wording I forgot. I also saw a website once about people with Asian letter tattoos that they think say things that are really deep, but are really like recipes for Kung Pao chicken and stuff. I am pretty sure mine is legit, though…The Body’s father was with me when I got it and wrote it out for the guy who did it.

#3 – I have a rose on my ankle…this one is cute:-) After my sophomore year, I went home for a week at the end of the summer, which was only the second time I had been back in about two years (it took me a year and a half to go back home when I left for school…more on that some other day). I took Munchkin to a fair and we got temporary tattoos. Then when I left the next day I was feeling kinda down and I really missed her, so I stopped on the way and had it done for real.

#4 – I have a sun kinda thing on the small of my back. This one doesn’t really have a deep meaning, it is just sorta cute. The Body was getting one done and I decided to get another one with her.

#5 – I have three rings with an interweaving vine on my foot. This one is really small and is the newest of them…I got it in July. In the story about my father, I mentioned that I never met him or his family until a couple years ago. Well, his family is awesome, and my cousins (all 13 of them!) are great. Of the 13, there are only two girls, both a little older than me (28 and 27) and are basically best friends. In July after I first met them all, I was invited to Favorite New Cousin #2’s wedding, which was really the first time I met the WHOLE family. Favorite New Cousin #1 was her maid of honor, and right before the wedding, the two of them went out and got matching tattoos of two interlocked rings with a weaving vine.

Favorite New Cousin #1 got married last summer and asked me to be one of her bridesmaids, which was just like the sweetest thing ever…I am crying writing about it…lol… She also asked Munchkin to be a flower girl, even though she is not actually related to her at all (you know how a wedding program lists the people and their relationship with the bride and groom? Well, Favorite Cousin #2 was “Dearest Cousin of the Bride” and I was “Newest Cousin of the Bride” and Munchkin was “Almost Cousin of the Bride” which I thought was super cute.) Anyway, I am way off track…

The two of them called me one day and said that right before the wedding they wanted to have a third ring added to their tattoos for me and for me to get the same thing. So that is where the rings come from…my connection with my two favorite cousins that my asshole father never let me meet until I was 22. So fuck him for one more thing.

So those are the five…and I have promised at least one more. Munchkin is, at least for now, completely obsessed with them. If she turned 18 tomorrow, she would run out and get the same rose done that I have, and she has also sold both Smoking Hot Roommate and Big Sis on us all getting something matching when she is old enough. That is still a long way off, and I am not going to encourage her if she changes her mind between now and then…lol. But she can be stubborn, so it wouldn’t surprise me if she ended up asking for these for her 18th birthday…

At which point I will be 30…yikes that makes me feel old.