Travel & Thank: Day 2. No Longer ‘a Girl With a Star-Shaped Tattoo’

I used to refer to the star-shaped tattoo on the back of my neck as a sort of a ‘power tattoo’ – an ultimate attention magnet. It was getting frustrating how much “fuss” it would create at times. In having it inked on my body, I meant it to cater to my social nature, the fact that I enjoyed getting attention and loved being the soul of the company, but I never really thought it would live up to this popular ‘expectation’ - tattoos’ ability to change one’s life, one’s perception of the world and the world’s perception of them.

For a long time most people seemed to only really remember about this one tattoo I had, forgetting all about others or just not remembering what or where they were, but all knew and seemed to really care about my “star” and it was the single one most attention grabbing and chat provoking body ‘art piece’ I had. It was getting old being referred to as “that girl with a star-shaped tattoo on the back if her neck”. The tattoo seemed to really leave up to its meaning of an “attention lover”. Frustrating, really.

I was really wondering when this would change or if it would ever change at all. After all, I had other tattoos to talk about, if people really wanted to talk tattoos. Or, I must admit, deep inside I even hoped people would just stop noticing it that much and stop paying it so much attention and stop asking about it (what’s there even to talk about, really?). No such luck. Until tonight. 

Me, aunt and mom had another great day in country C. – wandered a little more through the old town’s central part, walked down to the seaside, strolled all along the beach walk, been to the harbor, saw some historical sites by night, and later went to have dinner at a lovely Japanese spot. The place was discovered by mom and aunt on one of their nighttime seaside walks – they said when they saw this restaurant they immediately knew they would take me there once I joined them in country C. The dinner was all we expected, and the place lived up to our expectations, but what was the most pleasant surprise for me personally, was the ‘tattoo encounter’. I was wearing my hair up, so the back tattoos were on full display. The hostess noticed those and asked me… what my “think & thank” tattoo was all about!! The star tattoo finally got ignored, and for that I am thankful. Me and her even chatted about the importance of being thankful for what you had – now that’s something new. What a beautiful night!


Disclaimer: Travel & Thank™ is a mini-project within and is part of The ‘Thank You’ Project blog ©2009-2010. Travel & Thank™ updates are featured twice a week, are pre-written and not made in real time - each post was created during the author’s actual vacation in the mid-fall of 2010. For privacy reasons, the names of the persons, places and geographical locations may have been shortened, abbreviated or changed and are not subject to disclosure.