Inked

Leaving the midwest for the sunny western coast is a huge transition.  I wasn't quite 17 yet when I did it.  I wasn't a loner back home but I sure wasn't anyone's version of the popular girl.  I grew up tall and had a girl's version of my adult body by the time I was 14.  I was never embarrassed about my height but the same couldn't be said about how I saw the shape of my body.  No boy wants to date soft and fleshy girls.  Well, there are some but they typically aren't the healthiest choices for young girls.  Or was that just my lucky streak with the boys?  I'll leave that to be argued at a later time.

I had only seen east LA on the TV and I thought it best to keep my head down for the year I was there.  Senior year is already kind of crazy and I was the new kid on the block.  I didn't know their lingo or their mannerisms.  Quickly I became known as the tall blonde from the midwest.  Their view of their counterparts from the frozen tundra in the middle of the country was very rural, country and hayseed.  Regardless of who I was, my outsides screamed Swedish farm girl.  *shrug* 

So, I figured out that my accent identified me straight off.  It's been 20 years since I lived back home and yet people pick up on it right away.  It was considered "cute" in the west.  Something that made me unique and since it's always desirable to be unique it was sort of an advantage.  People remembered me as the tall, blonde girl with the quirky accent.  However, when you want to be considered something OTHER than cute and safe you try really hard to create a new persona and put it out there.  No one bought it.  Not really.  I just looked like a cute girl going thru a phase.  So, I pondered some more and ,with the encouragement of a friend back home, I took a huge plunge.  What could really show everyone that I wasn't some cute girl from the midwest but some bad ass girl living in the wild west?  A TATTOO!!  Yes, despite my fears of needles (at that point, fear doesn't quite explain how I felt about needles), I decided that a tattoo would be exactly what I needed.  I took my time.  No need to permantantly mark my body with something foolish just to make a point.  I walked into several parlors, flipped thru dozens of books with lots of pictures.  It was more overwhelming then I ever thought it would be.  Something classic, something unique, something edgy.  What to do, what to do.  I went back to my friend back home.  What was it that she had been asking me to do?  She loves tattoos and so she's got several but she's got one that was meant for us.  She had put 2 hearts on her bicep.  One blue and one green.  The green was for me and the blue was for her.  Ok, safe and quirky and something that required interest and questions.  Perfect!!

I was 20 and had asked around for recommendations.  I walked into a parlor near my fave beach.  It was laid back and sandy and not super organized.  Perfect!  I walked in, told the guy what I wanted and was instructed to sit backwards in the chair.  I came in wearing a bikini top uner my shirt so that I could stay covered up and yet allow access to my back.  Off comes the shirt and the bikini strap gets pushed to the side.  The instrument sounds like a horror story dental instrument.  It feels like someone is digging their nail into your skin.  There was a mirror in front of me so I made sure to divert my eyes so I didn't tense up. 

30 minutes later I'm inked up and feeling tough and ready to be a new me!!  It was patched up and under my bikini strap but I walked out a little taller, with a little bit of an attitude and swagger.  Bring it on!!!!!!!!!!!!

Fast forward 17 years.  My tat didn't change everyone's perception of me.  That's ok.  It's still a conversation piece.  What I hate now is that we are in VA and I work in accounting firm and instead of getting, "Hey, you have a tat!" I get, "That's not real, is it?"  Some of that is due to the accounting mentality, I get that.  A lot more of it has to do with the attitude in the mid-Atlantic that everyone wants to look just like everyone else.  Why would I put a temp dual heart tattoo on?  What purpose does that serve?  Also, what makes anyone think that a.) touching my tat tells you anything about it and b.) sneering at me for having one is beneficial to our day-to-day relations and c.) it's ok to poke me in the back?  People out here are weird.

So, that's that.  I'm inked.  I'm a bad-ass who's sat in the chair and had ink permanently put on my body.  It's in a place that shouldn't age badly.  Having a tat is part of who I am, part of my history, a reminder of a time in my life when I was so certain that I wasn't good enough just as I was.  It's also a reminder that I'm not as scared of life as I thought I was.  I still need that reminder and I'm glad it goes with me, no matter where I go!