Tattoos, Piercings and Other "Hardcore" Things

I would like for people to consider me edgy, hardcore, defying traditional societal norms. I work hard to project this image. In one of my many attempts to “appear” hardcore, I pierced my eyebrow. Actually, a large extremely tatted and pierced man in Northern California pierced my eyebrow… while I made jokes that he did not find funny. I wanted to look like Elka; my favorite cast member from Season 6 of MTV’s the Real World. Since Elka chose a hoop for her eyebrow, I selected a hoop for mine. I was, however, completely naïve to the horrors of having a hoop piercing sticking off your face. I found out, the hard way, that hoop earrings have a tendency of getting hit, pulled, caught or stuck on things. One day I woke up and my earring was caught on a loose thread attached to my pillow case. Terrifying! It was only a matter of time until my piercing would get caught and rip a giant hole through my eye. I had no choice but to take it out.

Later, after I graduated college, I decided to get my nose pierced at a classy establishment called the Voodoo Den. Learning from my previous mistake, this time I made the safe choice of selecting a stud piercing instead of the hazardous hoop. Everything was going fine, until the day I contracted a cold. I had to blow my nose constantly, causing the area around my new piercing to become raw and irritated. As cautious as I tried to be, the area around my piercing got more and more sensitive. I imagined pieces of renegade tissue getting stuck under my nose ring. The tissue would then lead to a horrible infection that my body, weakened by the cold, would be unable to fight off. I couldn’t risk such a morbid outcome. I was forced to choose between looking cool or my life, and I chose my life. 

After, yet again, another failure, I decided I needed to get a forever sticker, i.e. a tattoo, to make me forever hardcore. With a tattoo, it wouldn’t matter if I chickened out later, it only mattered if I had enough guts to sit down and let someone ink me up then. I wouldn’t be able to take it out, wipe it off or pretend it wasn’t there. Flawless logic! The question was what did I want on my body forever?!?!

Time passed, I moved to different states, had different jobs, made different friends, but still had not selected a tattoo. No theme in my life seemed constant enough to warrant a forever sticker, until, one day, while I was praying, it hit me! I had prayed that exact prayer before, well not exactly, the names were changed, but everything else was the same. In that moment, I realized that changing my surroundings didn’t change my circumstances. No matter where I moved, I came with me, and many times “I” was the problem. I didn’t need God to fix my circumstances; I needed him to fix me- from the inside out.

So, I got a tiny little heart tattooed on my hand. The bottom of the heart is shaded black to remind me that my heart is sinful and depraved, BUT the top is shaded red as a constant reminder that Jesus dwells inside my heart, redeeming and changing me from the inside out. No matter where I go, He goes with me.

It was only later when I realized tattooing a cute baby heart on my hand, ensured that no one would ever consider me hardcore.  Unless… I make it a full sleeve ;)