Well last sunday I went and got a
tattoo. I have been
toying with the idea for a quite a while but I never did it until now.
I would mention the
idea to my friends to
gauge their reaction, and I would
wonder where I could put it so I could
hide it when I wanted to and still
show it off when I wanted to. It occurred to me that if I was asking myself these
questions then perhaps I would be getting a tat for
all the wrong reasons.
Now
things are different. With the things that have
happened
recently, my
quarter-life crisis has hit hard and my resons for wanting a
tat changed. I did it
for and of myself and not
for any other reason. I didnt even tell my friends. I put it on my right deltoid which is where I wanted it and
I dont give
a damn who can see it and who cant.
I had only one moment of
hesitation - ( The guy had positioned the stencil and I made him wipe it off and move it down
about
1/2 a
centimetre. I apologised for being so picky and he said 'Hey you might as well be happy with it - its going to be there
forever')
I am glad I have it - I find it acts as a sort of
anchor for my sense of self. When I find myself
wondering who the fuck I am it
reminds me. Its there because
I put it there. It reminds me that I am not
the contents of my wallet.
It reminds me that
I am not my fuckin khakis.
The tat itself is the
Kanji character '
Su(ro)' which means 'To Do'. (
you can now see it here - props to amoeba_protozoa)
This has nothing to do with
Nike. For me its more about what
Gichin Funakoshi called
the wondrous enfoldment of doing - the concept of acting for no other reason than to do it, to do
it
fully and completely and for its own sake . It doesnt matter what 'it' is - it can be skiing, dancing or playing guitar - at times this is
my only refuge.
In the end I did it because I wanted to. After all
the body is a playground.