TATTOOS
Sometimes I ask, often I don’t, as I zap them with my iPhone, but I am fascinated by tattoos and the people who adorn themselves, sometimes all over. Tattoos are there for life, until the girl is a wizened old woman with sagging, flapping skin on which the tattoo will flutter forever. When the person broadens and broadens with middle age, the tattoos will, too, spreading wider and wider. It is hard to change your facial features but it seems easy to add tattoos. Just save your money, grit and bear it while being worked on, and you will walk out a different person.
Tattoos are a little like bumper stickers but they are there for life. You make a statement and you can’t outgrow it. And for so many people they are irresistible. It is almost a mystical experience, almost like being baptized. Tattooees dream and dream, searching for just the right design, and then commit for life. The “for life” part fascinates me but so does placing it so brazenly front and center and saying, like it or not, this is me, dragon lady or howling protester.
Tattoos used to be for sailors and bikers and people with huge biceps. Now they are for anyone, old or young, skinny or plump, ravishing or plain, anyone with a body and an itch to brighten it with design and color. So here are a few that have passed me that I’ve been quick enough, or they’ve been friendly enough, to catch in a photograph. And there will be more.
BILLYBABA’S WANDERING 