Permanent Ink

OK, so I'm thinking of getting a tattoo. I have a friend who is a tattoo freak, he has a bunch of really nice tattoos, mostly designed by himself, on various parts of his body. He explains to me that a tattoo is something personal, it must be art that you will never tire of because you will have it for the rest of your life. Though I don't want to dedicate my whole body to art, I do want a tattoo on my upper arm where I can sleeve it when I'm at clients, but show it off when I'm out with friends. .

I like the whole permanence of art aspect. Another friend has a tribal tattoo on his upper arm, on him it looks awesome, on me it would look lame. My first thought was to have a tattoo of a picture of a tree lined path splitting down the middle and the saying 'I Chose The One Less Traveled by' scrolled underneath. The line is from my favorite poem. It was written by Robert Frost and is called, “The Road Not Taken”. I actually love most/all of Frost's poems, but this particular one always seems to touch me. I'm sure you've heard the title, but If you haven't read the whole thing, I suggest you do so. Anyway, I scoured the Internet for pictures that would fit the bill. I even found a bunch of my own that I wanted to use. The problem came when I tried imagining ink on skin, the pictures just didn't seem to work.

I thought up a picture concept, but as much as I wanted the tattoo, there were two problems. First, my artistic capability is, let us say, limited(non-existent) so the design was trapped in my head. Second, even if the design could by some force of brain and pencil make it to paper, I'm not sure I would truly like the way it would look on me.

All of my problems were solved while my daughters were over. I gave them a drawing project to try and create the woods and the paths. I joined in and realized, just how hard it would be. While drawing, we became thirsty, so I made my way to the Frigidaire Art Museum to get us refreshments. Upon seeing the artwork, something inside me snapped. These are the pictures I want to have for the rest of my life, this is the artwork that I will never tire of seeing. I picked a couple off the fridge and realized the one that Lizzy did with the saying, “They'll never find out it's me”, would be perfect. People would never pick me as someone who would get a tattoo and I'm sure some family and friends reading this are shocked, appalled or both.

So now I have the picture and just need to get it done. I talked to my tattooed friend, who lives in North Carolina. Hopefully, this fall we are going to a tattoo artist, that he knows, and I will be the canvas for a great work of art.