Thoughts on Tattoos

Laurie Halse Anderson has an interesting post today. She received an email from a reader who plans to tattoo the word speak somewhere on her body, possibly neck, because of the tremendous impact Laurie's book Speak had on her. Laurie then described the tattoo she has, the first word of Beowulf, a powerful statement for a storyteller.

I've known for a long time that I'm not likely ever to get a tattoo. That's partly for religious reasons, but much more for personal ones. Now that sounds judgemental, but it's not how I mean it at all. I'm actually in awe and impressed by the above two examples. Women who have such a deep certainty about some aspect of themselves that they are ready to permanantly and publicly display it on their skin.

I'm not sure that I know myself all that well yet. Everytime I've contemplated a tattoo (or even a vanity license plate for that matter, though I know they are not the same) I cannot think of anything that so captures the essense of me that I know it will always be true. Not a word, not an image.

Now maybe I'm over thinking it.

Maybe I'm not.

Ink or no ink, however, I do look forward to the day when I feel as though I know something about myself that clearly.