My Whole Expanse I Cannot See…

So, I have another tattoo, my twenty-second tattoo. Usually, I’d write all about why I got it, what it means. Usually, I’d post a picture. Usually, I’m totally transparent, but not this time. I don’t think I want to share this particular tattoo with the Internets. I think it’s my most important tattoo, a tattoo about letting something go, but I don’t know if I want to say more. So, for right now, unless you regularly get to see me without a shirt, you won’t get to see this tattoo.

So, I’m now up to twenty-one tattoos. It’s funny, to me, how my tattoos have evolved since I started three years ago. Images that are metaphors, then words that reflect the noise in my head. Tattoos that show the light and dark in me, the last three years, pleasure and depression, written on my skin.

Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about why I’ve marked myself this way, to this degree. Much of it is my odd devotion to transparency, the idea that anyone can look at my tattoos, and my writing, and see the most honest parts of me. Part of loneliness is wearing a mask, pretending to be something different than what’s inside. A person can be lonely around friends, lonely with a lover, if they’re wearing a mask all the time. I want people to be able to “see” me if they want to look. I never felt lonely around Sara (the ex) when I could be transparent, and she loved me anyway. It’s a better feeling than any drug, to be known and loved without a mask. Unfortunately, with me and Sara, she looked inside and didn’t want some of what she saw. I admittedly tried to hide things I figured she wouldn’t like, as I honestly never wanted to be without her. It wasn’t much, but it was enough. I think part of me doesn’t want that to happen the same way again. So, I write the way I write, I wear my insides on the outside for anyone who cares to see. Now, I have twenty-one tattoos, twenty-one acts of transparency…

Tattoo #21 by Colt, hardcore motherfucking badass at Doc Dog's, Ybor City

This tattoo is another Elliott Smith lyric from a really elegant song, A Passing Feeling. I love the song because it so perfectly describes what it’s like when life absolutely does not feel good, and no matter what, that feeling will not go away. The song is so spectacularly honest, and plainly put. It’s very much how I’ve felt for so long, I’m stuck here waiting for a passing feeling. I think the song also describes the idea that a person doesn’t start out feeling stuck, astonishingly depressed. It’s a result of things quickly and steadily going to Hell. It’s not how I want to feel, but it’s honest to say that I feel it. The feeling will pass, or it won’t. It’s kind of odd, I’m struggling and waiting to feel right again, both at the same time.

It’s become kind of a tradition to get a new tattoo just before I get a fresh trache, the next being this coming Friday. So, last night I decided to hit Doc Dog’s Las Vegas Tattoo to have my man, Colt, etch a couple of words into my arm. Colt has done my last six tattoos, and he’ll be doing them until I drop dead, as was recently prophesied, or until I just run out of room or ideas. We’ll see which happens first.

Part of getting a tattoo, at least for me, is the shop’s atmosphere, which is why I love Doc Dog’s. It’s a very cool family business. Doc is Colt’s dad, he owns the shop. Doc actually started the first tattoo shop in Vegas. Colt’s mom is a lady named, Belle, she and Doc run the place. Belle also does piercings. Doc and Belle are always at the shop, or the Boneyard, the kickass bar next door. Colt hangs at the Boneyard between tattoos. I once wrote about them…

“I get my tattoos from a fellow named, Colt, a tattoo artist like his father before him. His mom and dad are usually around the shop, or the bar next-door. It’s an odd little family business, but they’re happier than most nine-to-fivers, it’s obvious they don’t go home and hate each other.”

They’re one of a few reasons why I like Tampa anymore. As for my twentieth tattoo…

It’s my third Elliott Smith tattoo from another of my favorite songs, Stupidity Tries. Specifically, I think it’s a song about his career and his life. He feels like a fuck up who writes songs about it, songs that people love, but he doesn’t get why. He’s fuck up, but he keeps going, though he’s not sure why. It’s a song about futility, about how we try for some kind of peace, even if it’s probably stupid to try. The song reminds me very much myself. I’m a fuck up, I consistently do really dumb things. I’m a fuck up who’s good at writing about it, and people say I’m amazing, but I don’t feel amazing.

Last summer, after Sara (the ex) had to move to Boston, and said that she wanted me to join her, I decided it would be a good idea to be drunk as often as possible. She figured I had it in me to do so, so just before she left, she asked me to promise to quit drinking entirely. I lasted a few weeks. I couldn’t handle the stress of figuring out how to move, the still newness of the trache, problems I was having with it, and the fact that I was just so lonely without her. Oh, and I never like being told I “can’t” do something. Her and my family were both against me drinking for different reasons.  So, after a particularly bad week I went out and drank way too much scotch. Apparently, I sent Sara a few drunk IMs before I passed out, and that was it. I fucked it all up.

I’m a fuck up, but I keep going anyway, even if I don’t always see a reason. I still want the kind of relationship I had with Sara, I want that life, and I keep trying to have it, even if trying might be stupid. I love someone else, and maybe that’s stupid, but whatever. Stupidity tries.

So, here we are, nineteen tattoos in something around three years. Nineteen thoughts bouncing around in my head, etched into my flesh. I think about my tattoos like I think about my writing, being honest is the most important thing. I have happy tattoos, and melancholy tattoos, each representing different versions of me. I carry around a constant visual record of my dark and my light. Nineteen tattoos that add up to the current me…

Tattoo by Colt, artist and hardcore motherfucker at Doc Dog's Las Vegas Tattoo, Ybor City

My mind is never quiet, sometimes it’s loud enough to make me crazy, especially when I can’t get the noise out. Not being able to talk is one thing, but not being able to write is something totally different. So, I was listening to Elliott Smith’s Tomorrow Tomorrow when one line in particular really hit me, “I got static in my head, the reflected sound of everything…” It so perfectly describes how I feel much of the time, but especially lately.

Tomorrow Tomorrow is a gorgeous song, it illustrates the feeling of drowning in thoughts, thoughts that lead to nowhere. Now, I have part of it written down the side of my chest. This is probably my favorite tattoo, as it says something about me that is constantly true.

So, before I get into my nineteenth tattoo, I should mention my eighteenth.

A few weeks ago, I came across a Nirvana song I’d never heard before, a B-Side versions of I Hate Myself and Want to Die. The song’s immediate appeal is its raw energy, but I always have to know a song’s lyrics after I decide I like how it sounds. After a lot of listening, and a little research, I found that the lyrics are really very interesting. Basically, I don’t think the song is about anything in particular, it doesn’t come together to tell a story. To me, it feels like random lines poetry, some of which probably don’t mean anything, while others definitely mean something…

Tattoo by Colt, artist and badass at Doc Dog's in Ybor

My favorite line, “I could never only, one day,” is what I picked for my eighteenth tattoo. I like it because it really describes my inner-struggle, the fact that I can’t simply wait for “one day.” I’m not a content fellow. I want certain things in my life, and I’m not particularly good at just waiting for them. Outwardly, I come off as very patient, and part of me genuinely is patient, but there’s another part of me that is constantly wanting. It’s been said to me by several people that maybe I should just accept the life I do have, that if I did do that I wouldn’t be so unhappy. The thing is, I absolutely cannot be content with that kind of acceptance. I don’t think it’s crazy to want a life bigger than my stylishly decorated little room, a life of writing, a life with a lover and space apart from my family. There’s nothing wrong with wanting those things. Having had and lost those things, I’m completely certain that I cannot be content without them. Honestly, the idea of living a life of never having has gotten to be more terrifying than the thought of dying.

So, I’m out with my friend, Sarah and my assistant, Sarah, in Ybor City. Ybor is pretty much entirely bars, clubs and tattoo shops, with a few really good restaurants. لعبة الخيل عبر الانترنت I’m a regular just about everywhere. سباق الخيل مباشر Bartenders know me, waiters know me, the tattoo artists definitely know me.

We’re there on this particular evening for my seventeenth tattoo. It’s one word, “Downer,” etched into my left wrist. Lately, I get my tattoos from a fellow named, Colt, a tattoo artist like his father before him. His mom and dad are usually around the shop, or the bar next-door. It’s an odd little family business, but they’re happier than most nine-to-fivers, it’s obvious they don’t go home and hate each other.

“Downer, like Xanax and shit?” he asks.

I don’t have a computer when I go out, it’s just not practical. Whenever I’m out and about, I talk to people using the alphabet. I should explain, talking with the alphabet involves a person saying each letter of the alphabet and me signaling with my eyebrows when to stop at a particular letter. Then, each letter gets written down in a notebook.

I tell him, “no, it’s a Nirvana song.” I tell him, “but also, I do really like downers.” Morphine, Demerol, we’re old friends. They’re the upside of getting tubes pulled out of and shoved into the hole in my throat. I have this done every five weeks, one doesn’t want their trache getting stale. Still, it’s not a drug tattoo, I have two already. Been there. Done that.

Really, Downer is one of my favorite Nirvana songs. To me, it’s an indictment against insincerity. Downer mocks the fact that we do things and say things because we’re “supposed to,” and not because they’re right, or honest. People pray to God, whether they believe or not. People thank God out of habit or fear, whether He deserves it or not.

I don’t want to live my life pretending to be someone I’m not, simply to fit some arbitrary standard of “normal.” I try to show that in my writing, I try to show that in the words that are etched into my flesh.

Have you ever felt strongly enough about words to consider making them a part of your body? كيف تلعب بلاك جاك

So, I’d wanted a tattoo on my left hand for a long time, something to balance out the poppy on my right. I wanted an image that said something about me in a simple, yet elegant way. Well, last night, thanks to Colt, tattoo artist and all around fucking cool guy over at Doc Dog’s Las Vegas Tattoo Company, I have my sixteenth tattoo…

Nirvana Smiley

The Nirvana smiley pretty much describes me since, forever. I’m basically a happy, depressed sort of fellow. I’m both at once, I’m cheerful darkness. I think that’s the most honest way to characterize the me in my head.

Last night, as is now tradition, I went out to celebrate the anniversary of my trach, or as my friend, Monica, called it, my “tracheversary.” The idea is to take what could be a rather odd and depressing day, and turn it into something fun. So, to that end, I went to paint the town red with my assistant, Sarah, my friend, Sarah, and the previously mentioned, Monica.

It was a smaller affair than last year, just us four. The tone was different too, no reminiscing about the hospital, or me almost dying. They didn’t know me back then, so there was really no reason to talk about it, which was nice. I’ve written a lot about those days, but I don’t particularly like talking about them in casual conversation. I’d also never been out with so many people who could do the alphabet. Usually, only one person in a group knows how to do it, so I pretty much only talk that person, and if that person isn’t necessarily good at it, I hardly talk at all. Both Sarahs and Monica are good at it, so I don’t feel lonely around them, it’s nice.

Now, an interlude of pictures…

It’s cold in Tampa!

Monica and Sarah discuss socioeconomic policy.

Monica and I chattin’ it up!

After dinner and what-not, it was time for my fifteenth tattoo. Unless it’s a real art-piece, I don’t like to schedule my tattoos. They’re more fun spontaneous, left to fate. So, last night, after much walking up and down 7th avenue in the bitter cold, visiting four shops, we finally found someone available to etch words into my flesh. We ended up at Doc Dog’s Las Vegas Tattoo Company, a place I’d walked by dozens of times, but had never been. As it turns out, Doc Dog’s is fucking spectacular, everything you could ever want in a tattoo shop. It’s so perfect, not too brightly lit, crazy art on the walls, tattoo needles buzzing everywhere. It was just right for my new ink.

Whenever someone tells me that I can’t do something, my usual reaction is to go and do it anyway, it’s just my way. Doing so always reminds me of a scene from my favorite film, Stay. Sam (Ewan McGregor) is talking to a strung out Beth (Janeane Garofalo). She’s just had a nervous breakdown and has taken a liking to liquor and pills. Sam sees her table-top pharmacy and says, “you can’t drink while you’re taking these,” to which she notes, “apparently, I can.” Hence the tattoo…

Tattoo #15

I really don’t like being told what I can or cannot do simply because none of my muscles work. My decisions are mine, sometimes I forget that, so it’s good to be reminded.

Me and Colt, tattoo artist and all-around badass.

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So, somewhere in December while I was busy being astonishingly depressed, I got my fourteenth tattoo.

I was feeling particularly lonely, down, very uneasy about pretty much everything, kind of just staying “okay” as best I could from one day to another. The worst part was that I didn’t see many reasons why “tomorrow” would be any better. That is a really horrible sensation. I felt exactly like this tattoo and the song from which it came…

It’s my third Nirvana related tattoo, it’s my least happy tattoo, but it’s honest.

Last night, with the upcoming trache change and all, I decided to go for my thirteenth tattoo. I’m really into Elliott Smith, I think his music is some of the truest, most honest music ever written. Astonishingly sad, but honest. I’d wanted an Elliott Smith tattoo for some time, I just needed a proper idea. The idea came to me after Pitseleh came up in my shuffle a few weeks ago…

The song is perfect, and it describes exactly how I feel about myself. I fucked things up with Sara, can’t change it, can’t go back. I just totally fucked up, and I wanted to note my mistake, wanted something to externalize it. So, here we are…