My first tattoo was a bliss - three small kanji signs on my arm. Something that looked so beautiful. Something I could look at now and then during my work-out or when I was wearing sleeveless shirts. My second one led me to tattoo my left wrist and that was where my problems began. One wrist tattoo looked so nice and was so easy to cover with my wrist bands. Then I decided to go for another one and, to my big surprise (???), suddenly my wrist bands were to short to cover everything. Suddenly people started questioning me "why?", "what for?" and I did not want to go in details about my reasons behind my tattoos. No, I did not regret them, at least I do not remember such a feeling but I do remember clearly this nasty feeling of uneasiness about my wrist.
At A Glance Author Ania Contact [email protected] IAM deadly pale When N/A During first weeks after getting the second wrist tattoo I kept wearing long aid band made of gauze on my wrist - in case someone questioned me, I could always say that I hurt my wrist during my work-out sessions. Now, when I come to think about it, I think I just needed some time to realize that I should not be afraid of what others might say about me or things I was/am/will be doing. I felt this nasty, uneasy feeling for days on end and knew that there was really no one I could talk to about my feelings and decisions. BME was already becoming an important part of my life back then, so I decided to write an experience about my wrist tattoo. The main reason of writing this experience was just to talk to myself, to see what I really felt about it and what reasons I might bring to convince myself that I made a good or wrong decision. I thought that having doubts or feeling even the slightest traces of uneasiness about any mod means that I am worse than all other people getting modded every day all over the world. I thought that once again I could see that I did not fit anywhere, even here.
I wrote a long, moving (at least for myself) text telling about my feelings and how unhappy I was about having them. I ended with a positive note because writing really helped me, at least for a while. I could organize my thoughts, I could see what I felt deep within and, above all, I could talk to myself about my feelings and reasons behind my actions. This whole writing experience helped me to see and learn more about myself. I felt it was a good text but, eventually, it was ...denied. I understood reasons BME reviewers presented me with and I was quite okay with this denial. The main goal of this text was achieved right after I finished writing it, right after I understood myself a little bit more and when I felt that my uneasiness was washed away by my clearer, less emotional and more objective thoughts. Another good thing was that many of those who denied my text left me good, uplifting comments and let me know that sometimes they also felt this way about their new piercings/tattoos/scars. I found relative peace of mind and got rid of uneasiness.
But is it possible to be always sure? Is it possible to always know that I/you/they will never ever regret their decisions? I do not know about others but I do know that now and then I look at myself and am amazed by things I did to myself.
The second and third time when I felt "this nasty uneasiness" deep within were when I got my text tattoos . It is not that I regretted them, not at all. There was not even one second of feeling any regrets but I suddenly was afraid that the words I had my tattoo artist tattoo on me would lose their power. The fragments I decided to tattoo on me were so powerful and so uplifting for me that they kept giving me (positive) creeps whenever I read them. But things you do often lose their charm for you after a while, do not they? I was afraid that my word tattoos would become only somewhat meaningful body decoration. Something well done but so ordinary and more and more "profanum" than "sacrum". Was I right? Yes and no. "Yes" because I do not feel any shivers after reading my Eddaic fragment tattooed on my body... simply because I do not read it that often. "No" because there are times when I cannot reach to my bookshelf to get my copy of Prosaic Edda to get some comfort from reading it and then I can always look at my forearm and tell myself "All right then, that's what it is, nothing more, nothing less" and any problem or cause for frustration gets back to its quite small dimensions.
I got my most visible tattoos this year: my both inner forearms were tattooed, one of them red, a color that is hard to overlook; I began to work on my sleeve and thus overcame my real doubts about having something so visible, huge and permanent on me for the rest of my life. I notice people passing me by on the street and looking on my arms; I see kids staring at me and sometimes asking questions; now and then I have to deal with men saying "hey, nice tattoos; where else you have them?" or older people asking me "why?". But even though I am "honored" with a bigger amount of attention than I would really like to have I do not feel this uneasiness anymore. It might come in the future, who knows, but I do not feel it now because now I feel stronger and better-looking with every new tattoo on me. However, my tattoo sessions always let me feel a bit "uneasy".
Do you have your favorite parts of the tattoo process? I do. My first, most thrilling part of the process does not begin right after making the decision about it and setting the appointment nor with appearing at the studio to get my newest tattoo done. No! It begins after applying the stencil and my tattoo artist's hand, armed with a tattoo machine, coming closer and closer to my body. He is ready to begin, everything is set and it is almost certain that I get something done. This is the most crucial part of the tattoo process. Do I really want to have this tattoo? Is it really so important to me to suffer maybe not the pain as I do not feel that much but inconvenience and then people's stares? Am I brave enough to tell the artist, here and now, that I just changed my mind and do not want it anymore? This one moment when his hand is about to begin and when I play with the thought of saying "no" and leaving the studio is really thrilling and, now and then, I joke with my current artists about it and tell them how much I love this blissful moment of uncertainty when everything depends on my strength to say "yes" or "no".
After a "\�w�� few hours under the needle and after thinking about my feelings, both those positive and those "uneasy" ones, I am coming to realization that it is a good thing to have some doubts about my tattoos. I take them as something positive for a few reasons.
First of all, by means of asking myself such questions as "was it worth it?", "am I afraid of people's reactions?", "am I strong enough to defend my choices?", "are my tattoos really that important to me to have them on me forever?" I can re-define myself from time to time. Thinking about past decisions related so strong to my body and relations with others help me understand more about myself then and now and the person I am growing to become.
Secondly, questions I ask myself or uneasiness I might feel are my anchors in time. Whenever I feel uneasy about my tattoos (it is mostly tattoos as they are much more permanent than piercings and I never felt weird about my scars), I can trace my decisions back to the time I made them. I do admit here that at such a time my experiences submitted to and accepted by BME are very helpful - I always try to write my experiences with as many details as possible, not so much for others but rather for myself because, just like at this one fateful night of writing my experience about a tattoo I felt so uneasy about, they help me understand myself and my reasons/decisions/philosophy behind my tattoos. My texts, archived somewhere in the vast memory of BME, are there not only to document actions of some young Polish woman modifying her body in various places of the world but they are also there to remind her why she made such a step, what she felt at the moment, what is hidden under her skin and in her mind.
Thirdly, my tattoos help me accept my body and discover it over and over again in many ways. Some of them are on my body for a few years now, some of them are only a few months old, age of others can be counted in weeks. I see them every day, twice a day every single day I make sure to moisturize them with a body lotion to make them look as bright and vivid as possible. I work out more diligently and run longer distances to make sure they are on a healthy, fit body. I see them every day but now and then I am amazed by their extent (no matter how meagre it is in comparison to other people's work), shape, shades and, above all, that they are on me and that now they will always be there. Thanks to them I can see me changing over the years and through my various experiences much better and clearer. Whenever I ask myself "why", "was it worth it?", "will I regret it eventually?", I know I have answers for those questions and am quite satisfied with them.
I do not know how others feel about their mods. I do not talk with other IAM-ers about that as we tend to be too enthusiastic about our mods and new plans to think about anything less positive. I do not ask questions and I do not expect answers. All I have is this one message from BME with comments telling me why reviewers decided to deny my text and that some of them knew how I felt back then. And all I have is my own philosophy behind my tattoos and my own willingness to be ready for having doubts, uneasy feelings about my decisions and answering my own questions. It is not about not belonging here, to BME or IAM; it is not about what others might say and whether you will be strong enough to deal with their questions and stares; it is not about selling out or pretending I am someone who I obviously (since I have second thoughts) am not. It is all about me and whether I am ready and brave enough to look deep within myself and face my own questions and doubts. As long I am able to answer them and talk to myself really honestly about them, as long I can be sure that I made the right decision.