You cant have just one (12/11/2007)

Talk to just about anyone who has one and I'll bet they'll tell you the same thing; Tattoos are kind of like potato chips, you can't have just one.  

This one was my first tattoo.  I got it on the same day that I sat myself down and said, "Gina, You're a Lesbian."  Not that it was really news to me... it was just the first time I let myself say it aloud.  I was 27 and it was the first time in my life that I felt I had any power, that I had control.  Somehow that translated into the need for a tattoo. Maybe because as taboo as getting inked still was then... it was still better than being Gay. Only sailors and Hell's Angels and "different" people had tattoos.  At last... I finally identified myself with a group... those who were "different", and it just felt right. 

I walked into the first tattoo parlor I could find, determined, proud, and excited.   Excited until the tattoo "artist" appeared from behind the curtain of cigarette smoke that separated the front of the establishment from the back.  Her sandpaper voice coated with tequila wasn't exactly reassuring.  As it turned out, she was one of the nicest people I ever met. She was the first to acknowledge my "different-ness"... she was the first to accept it.  

The parrot  that ended up on my shoulder blade has no significance whatsoever. It was just the first drawing in all of their "portfolios" that didn't involve skulls, knives or snakes. I wasn't leaving until I had ink in my skin...until I was really "different".

My second tattoo is a wizard. It commemorates my sister finding her own power.  For whatever her reasons were, a tattoo would signify the power for her too.  I took her to a much better place, it was clean, and tattoos were just becoming "fashionable".  I paid, she insisted I get another, she picked the wizard, and I grinned.. a big sister grin as my sister and I reclaimed our power in blood and ink.  

It's been 4 or 5 years, since my last tattoo.   I have since then, found another power within me... one that has survived 14 years of emotional abuse, one that has stopped the abuse, one that is determined (as hard and painful as it is)... to be me... to be different ... still.  

The want for another tattoo is growing.  I just don't know yet what it will be.  But it will be different... like me.