....me posting.
This, since my site is a BIG SECRET from my Partner Unit. So when he is around, I cannot log in and check my site, dump my thoughts off, or anything like that. I know this may kick off a whole "Secrets and lies" dialog amongst people, should I tell him, should I not, but the thing of it is...this site is for me. This is a drama that others in the blog community have been going through, but as far as I am concerned, my site is not for him. It is, sometimes, enough of an disabler that two people in my real life even know about this site.
And one secret amongst many that my partner unit does not know the real truth of, is my tattooes.
Someone commented that they saw, in my pictures, the hint of a tattoo on my ankle. The truth is, I have two tattoos. Both of them are for men that I have loved more deeply than I know words to express it. The one on my ankle started out thus:
I was in university at the time, and living with my boyfriend in Dallas. One night, he went out drinking with some friends and I stayed at home. I was joined shortly by his friend, Maria. Now, Maria and I had had a rough relationship-she had really hated me at the beginning, and seeing as how she was an ex-girlfriend of my boyfriend's that still wanted him back, things were often tense between us. Sometimes we were great friends. Sometimes, I hated the bitch. One never knew which way the wind would blow between us.
That night, we were drinking cheap wine coolers by the four-pack. We got a bit tanked, and I decided-I was going to get a tattoo. She had several, and was behind me all the way. We walked from the house to Lower Greenville, a very happening place in Dallas that was a mere four blocks away, and I walked into a tattoo parlour. I told the beefy, stereotype tattoo artist that I wanted to get a "K". A K, since the name of my boyfriend was Kim. He agreed with no preamble, and thus, slightly drunk, I got the K tattooed on my ankle. Maria and I hobbled home, and I waited for my boyfriend. She and I debated if she and I should have sex together before he came home-after all, she was bisexual and I was, well, curious, and we both wanted to know what K saw in the other in bed-but my boyfriend came home before that could happen.
Now, you may ask why I got that tattoo, since I am obviously not with him any longer. The truth is, I did it because I was so absolutely, utterly, wildly in love with him. I was mad for his touch, his presence, his nearness. He taught me how to breathe, how to live, how to love. He gave me blinding orgasms, the first I had ever had in my whole history of faking it with the pathetic parade of miscreants that came before him. He was my everything, and always would be.
I knew, even if we split up, it would forever only be temporary. We couldn't stay apart, we didn't know how to. We would meet up in a cafe, some years down the road, and bury the time we had apart between us like a box that simply never existed. I seriously did not believe I could live without him. When we split up. I had to move out of town to get him out of my fucking mind. I drank too much. I took up work as a form of control. I left the country. I changed my appearance. I went back to a tattoo artist and had the K turned into the Japanese symbol for "endurance and eternity". Because that is how long I will love him. Cheesy, but true. Some people just reach in and leave a stamp on you, and no matter how hard you try, you may always read: "Property Of: "
But I don't have to wait for him, to have him in my life again after a short spell without. I can't wait for him, actually. There will not be a cafe for us to meet up in, to find ourselves inseperable again, with no words neeed.
He died shortly after we split up.
The other tattoo is on my shoulder, you can see a little black blob in my main picture. It is also a Japanese symbol, the one for "heaven". Now, this does not mean white robes, God, and St. Peter. The Japanese define heaven as a state of pure and perfect happiness. And for me, this state perfectly described another man in my life, a man who will remain nameless. He brought the biggest and greatest property claims to my heart, deeds that he still owns and always will. He burned off Kim'S "Proprty Of: " marker and made his own.
When I hear that Matchbox 20 song "You Won't Be Mine", it makes me grieve for him, to ache for him, to hate the lots that life gave us. Because sometimes I truly think that he won't be mine. That, like my first love, there will be no cafe for us someday down the road.
Some people have asked me if I regret either of my tattooes. That since I got them for men, perhaps I am sorry that I chose to open up my body as a canvas, an illustration of loss. And the truth is I don't regret either tattoo, not for a second. When I love someone and let them inside of me I give them all I've got. I don't regret getting the tattooes for those two men, the two greatest, scariest passions in my life.
Because the truth is, I would've done a lot more than that for both of them.
The question is not: what would you do for love?
The question is: what wouldn't you do?
-H.
Posted by Everydaystranger at September 27, 2003 05:16 PM | TrackBack