Skip to main content

Tattoos


I've been thinking about getting a tattoo for the last few years. Two young teachers I worked with in "06 wanted to give me one for a good-bye gift. It just never happened. I moved to Portland, and they moved to different schools. It was going to be on my forearm. A rainbow trout; colorful but small and tasteful, I imagined.
It still may happen. Katie wants to get one too. Probably a Buddha...a tiny Buddha.
In thinking about the word and concept: tattoo...seems to me I already have a few. We all do, even our cars, trucks, bikes, but definitely our bodies. When I look at what were once very small freckles or birth marks on my arms, neck, back, I think, they've become a kind of tattoo. Scars are tattoos also. I see the mark made at 14 in wood shop. A slipped chisel leaves a tattoo. By my elbow is a spider webb fragment from a horse who wanted all my carrots and nudged me into a barbed wire fence because I resisted. Invisible is the tattoo I wear under my lip from Leonard. The violent 12 year old I met and worked with in a residential treatment center. His teeth form another one on the underside of my right bicep. He would always ask the next day, "What happened to you?" I'm sure, if he's still alive, he has many tattoos.
I figured a beautiful little rainbow on my forearm would honor all those who I've caught and released. Their color is so instantly vibrant, their eyes, large and aware. When I lose the ability to perceive the sacredness of a trout and all it takes to keep one alive, I'll be no good for anything, so at least I could take one with me this way. Seems a fitting tattoo, but until I "catch" the notion to get one, I'm content knowing I have a few that tell stories all along the way.

Comments

troutbirder said…
life history in scars. Indeed. Mental too. Go for that tatoo. Mine will have to be a brown though!
Blues Greene said…
I'm hoping there's enough "Bush tax refund" left to get that tattoo and my '08 Oregon license. I've seen some wonderful birds (otters too) while knee deep in my favorite rivers. A great combo, troutbirding!

Popular posts from this blog

To a Tee

 I'm a sucker for a good t-shirt.  They are the foundational garment of my life.  My day starts with selecting a t-shirt and it ends with sleeping in one.  Once thought of as under garments, t-shirts are now original art and no doubt, a billion dollar business.   You can get a t-shirt with anybody's picture displayed.  You can commemorate an event, a birthday, a death, even a specular play in any sport.  Family reunions usually have a commemorative t-shirt.  Also, any organization that solicits your support in the form of a donation is likely to offer you a t-shirt. Where once I only had the basic white t-shirt, my drawers are filled with all manner of colorful choices.  Some recognize major events in my life, some, spectacular performances or plays I have witnessed, and some unforgettable places I have been.   I say I'm a sucker for a good t-shirt because I have taken the bait on what I perceived as a must-have only to be disappointed. ...

Illusory

What does it take to enrage you?  That moment when your words fly on pure emotion because enough is enough.  Is it a driver that cuts you off at high speed?  What about being an eyewitness to blatant racism or on the receiving end of some obvious injustice? I know some people who never express rage.  I admire them but know full well I am not capable of such distance from that which would bring about such a strong response. Another senseless shooting and 7 people die at the hands of a mentally ill gun owner.  The father of the 20 year old college student lets it fly and somehow millions feel a new sense of relief.  He calls the politicians bastards who do nothing, he wears his pain in public.  The news media responds but we all know that nothing is going to change.  We are the gun country.  We are the place where anybody, anytime, can be cut down just for being there when somebody else snaps. Usually the perpetrators are delusional. ...

Mr. Greene v. Mr. Brown

I want to tell you about something. Something I've carried inside myself for a number of years now. Perhaps if I were a different kind of person I wouldn't need to talk about it. I'm not. My need to tell it is stronger than your need to hear it. Because, however, there are a number of teachers and former students of mine who may read these meanderings from time to time, I need to tell this story all the more. About 7 or 8 years ago I was asked if I would allow a university PhD. candidate to observe an English class. At first I decided against it because I was scheduled to have a student teacher placed with me the second half of the semester in question. After some urging, however, at the request of a respected colleague, I agreed. Soon I was committing to extra meetings, signing documents and explaining to the class in question who the young woman who thoughtfully pounded away on a laptop in the rear of the classroom three times a week was. I knew that the topic of ...