A Permanent Memory

I'm tired of being told that a few years down the road I'll regret the art I have. I'm tired of the mere fact that it exists making people assume things about my personality. But mostly I'm tired of people not taking time to understand that there IS a story behind what I have and why I got it.

So I'm young and I have a tattoo
...so what.
Does that make me a bad person? Because I have that tattoo, have I now become a delinquent?

Nine months of constant thought went into this piece of artwork. I spent night after night, searching for pictures, drawing my own, and writing out script and calligraphy. I made sure what I got meant the most to me. Nine months worth of days I went to sleep looking at the drawing of it pasted to my wall by my bed, only to wake up staring at it again. If I wasn't able to handle looking at it every day for that long of a period of time, believing wholeheartedly that it was perfect then I wasn't ready to get it.

My tattoo has a reason to exist and holds the story behind it right beneath the surface. Just far enough down that you have to look for it and you can't just see it in the image. Just because the image is pretty doesn't mean that's always the reason behind it.

Every time I hear how much I will regret this down the road I just think about the road I took to decide what I wanted, and how hard I thought about what I was doing before I did it.

So people will see it if I wear specific types of clothing...
Just because they see it doesn;t mean they understand it.
And maybe I don't want to always have to hide it.

 I didn't do this for anyone but myself. There's no good reason I could have gotten a tattoo for someone else. This tattoo, and any others to come, will tell a story of my journey through life trying to find out who I am and what I was meant to do. Everything I get will tell a story... The question is who will get to know the story and who won't?

It is a reminder not to let anyone force me to be someone else. And a reminder of how strong I can be when I put my mind to it. A reminder of my past, and all the hard work I have put in to get where I am today.

This is MY permanent memory. THIS is how I choose to wear my scars. No one but me has to accept it. No one but me has to understand it, because if you can't see past my surface then you don't deserve to know the real me, or the meaning behind it all.

And honestly, if artwork isn't artwork because of the medium it's done on, then how is any of what we call art definable under the circumstances. Wouldn't it be one of the highest forms of a compliment to any artist to want to have their artwork emblazoned on my body for the rest of my life, and even in death still have them into whatever awaits me after my death?