i can promise you i didn't do anything system-preferences-related that would have caused my laptop to delete all of the files on my hard drive and in my icloud account last night; the most exotic alteration i make to it is the application and removal of a triangular piece of washi tape when i want to reveal its camera for a zoom interview or cover it up for everything else. i can also tell you the cats didn't do anything weird to the machine, because i closed it and sat on the couch watching msnbc for like fifteen minutes before opening it to a blank desktop. just closing and opening, and there were a few drafts i'd put in the trash that i couldn't restore because they'd turned from word to excel files(?).
this morning i spent half an hour on the phone with a tech who ultimately made me a reservation at the apple store that turns out to be in the oculus down by the world trade center, a mall that seems designed to send people tumbling down wide flights of marble stairs. at the genius bar i was the undiagnosable malady of the day: my genius confirmed that i hadn't undone any of the protections that were supposed to prevent my computer from eating itself, and that all of my drafts, research, contracts, interviews, transcripts, invoices, pictures disappeared at the same time for secret reasons. "it even took all of your music," he marveled. he confided that he was an artist and didn't keep any of his drawings on his machines; they all lived on an external drive. he showed me an amazon product page that i photographed with my phone (i was later advised that if this freakish thing ever happened again i should jam my phone into airplane mode, which would maybe outrun the sync that would devour all of its files, too.)
we eventually figured out that about 5,000 files - a weird mix of my work, individual, like, live at leeds tracks i don't even remember transferring from a disc to the machine i had before this one, and a bunch of files i'd deleted intentionally in 2014 were wandering in some sort of digital bardo apple had recently created for people who i guess deleted all of their shit and then had changes of heart? but it wasn't searchable and it wouldn't upload in a batch, so i had to "brute force" it (per the genius) and hope the stuff i wanted was in there.
i walked home past trinity church and the supreme courthouse and thought about how while i wanted to revise the pain-in-the-ass super-science-y story i've been working on all summer i really just wanted to know that a little video of steve jumping for a mylar balloon still existed somewhere that i could find it, and i cried a little. i said that to another apple tech on a phone appointment an hour later. "i lost a cat earlier this year too," he said. "i'd raised it from when it was so small it fit in my hand, and then it lived outside, and i went out to a doctor's appointment for a headache or something and when i came back ants were crawling all over it." he said he had a little boy and he would be devastated if his pictures of him disappeared; what if, one day when he was twice as old as he is now, he couldn't remember his son when he was a little boy and he didn't have the photos to help him, what if they were just gone from his mind one night?
some of my batch-restoring attempts eventually worked (brute force!) and i found the steve video. his balloon is yellow mylar, star-shaped, and he meows questions at it before leaping in the air to catch its ribbon in his teeth. his back curves like it does in the tattoo luca font designed for me at the beginning of the summer; i had sent him a couple of photos ahead of time, but when i showed up for my appointment, he asked me where steve's stripes were when i remembered them. one of the things i have always loved about tattoos is the thought that they can't be taken away; no matter where i go or what i become, i have jude's three legs, chuck's shadow at my back, steve forever in the air.
Showing posts with label tattoos. Show all posts
Showing posts with label tattoos. Show all posts
11.04.18(ii)
when we decided to go to rome this fall, i dove into a search for local tattoo artists. i found a glorious one almost immediately, but it was clear that her style would make my back look funky: the blackwork i have is woodcut-inspired, ill-suited to share space with goddesses. i settled into following her on instagram and figured that would be it.
my beloved—yes, beloved—ladymag announced that it would be departing from print a few weeks ago. i sat with that news for a long time, and it hurt much more than i imagined it would; publishing has made me tremble for more than a decade now, but motherfucker, i thought the old girl would survive. i was its research chief for a long time, so i used to field the calls that had nowhere else to go: could you tell some more stories, the elderly readers said, i don't know where to go for stories anymore. my ladymag was no longer the one that published prestige fiction decades ago, but it remained, in These Modern Times, one that gave women a place to convene.
i stayed up for a long time and thought about that, and about a departing editor-in-chief's comment about how what she would carry with her from our office was the sound of women laughing. the sun started clawing its way over long island, and i wrote a note to the artist who was too intricate for me: hey, i have the good fortune to be in rome next week and, while i imagine you have no time, might you be able to tattoo a moth on my wrist? so many things happen to our bodies that we can't control, and fuck it, i wanted a beautiful insect on me. i wanted gorgeous vermin, i wanted to feel like myself. her first note came back the next morning, so i decoupaged a google image printout on my arm. three days later, just before we saw the magic flute for my birthday, she said she had time for me later in the week; a two-day job had taken her just one day.
joe dislikes tattoos—unfortunate, given that i had two when we met and have acquired several more in the decades we've been together—and told me, you don't have to go through with this if you don't want it. at that point we had been in rome for nearly a week, and a hummingbird hawk moth had visited our terrace's flowers for five nights. it's been three weeks, now, and the antennae peek out of my sleeve every day.
my beloved—yes, beloved—ladymag announced that it would be departing from print a few weeks ago. i sat with that news for a long time, and it hurt much more than i imagined it would; publishing has made me tremble for more than a decade now, but motherfucker, i thought the old girl would survive. i was its research chief for a long time, so i used to field the calls that had nowhere else to go: could you tell some more stories, the elderly readers said, i don't know where to go for stories anymore. my ladymag was no longer the one that published prestige fiction decades ago, but it remained, in These Modern Times, one that gave women a place to convene.
i stayed up for a long time and thought about that, and about a departing editor-in-chief's comment about how what she would carry with her from our office was the sound of women laughing. the sun started clawing its way over long island, and i wrote a note to the artist who was too intricate for me: hey, i have the good fortune to be in rome next week and, while i imagine you have no time, might you be able to tattoo a moth on my wrist? so many things happen to our bodies that we can't control, and fuck it, i wanted a beautiful insect on me. i wanted gorgeous vermin, i wanted to feel like myself. her first note came back the next morning, so i decoupaged a google image printout on my arm. three days later, just before we saw the magic flute for my birthday, she said she had time for me later in the week; a two-day job had taken her just one day.
joe dislikes tattoos—unfortunate, given that i had two when we met and have acquired several more in the decades we've been together—and told me, you don't have to go through with this if you don't want it. at that point we had been in rome for nearly a week, and a hummingbird hawk moth had visited our terrace's flowers for five nights. it's been three weeks, now, and the antennae peek out of my sleeve every day.
12.10.16
i wasn't planning on getting a tattoo on our trip abroad this year; i'm running out of space for them, as i prefer to get them along my spine and i don't seem to be getting any taller, and berlin didn't feel exotic enough (ha). i then learned, via one of the david-bowie-in-berlin books i bought a month before we left, that bowie's old building in schöneberg (in which he lived from 1976-1978) boasts not one but two tattoo studios; well, hell. maybe it was time for a GIANT ARTY BARN OWL across the top of my back?
my foreign-tattoo m.o. is pretty complicated: i tend to reach out to the artist or studio i have in mind long before we leave new york, and we become penpals over the course of a few months. i drop by to say hello and chat when we first get into town, a few days before my appointment, and then get whatever lagoon-soaking or intense bathing i'd planned out of the way; then it's tattoo time. this was going to be different, as i hadn't yet settled on a specific design and we were about to leave; the black-metal guys at Studio 1 a) sounded like they weren't interested in any work but their own, which is completely understandable but probably wasn't going to work for me, given time constraints, b) were only in the building by appointment, c) had portfolios with a lot of burning nordic churches in them, which was more than a little intense, and d) seemed like they were into some less-than-egalitarian erotic art featuring ladies? one of Studio 1's artists was in new york the week before we went to berlin and i could have looked him up, but he didn't seem like the guy for me. i didn't even know Studio 2 existed, in turn, until i saw a line on Studio 1's webpage about how people should not go there. its website was pretty generic, but i've learned that plenty of lovely people have a hard time getting their digital shit together (cough). the more i read of bowie's adventures in berlin with iggy pop, brian eno, and tony visconti, the more convinced i became that i needed to embrace their spirit of collaboration and improvisation. some friends of mine got black star tattoos after bowie's death back in january, and the simplicity of that appealed to me. i could fit it below my lowest tattoo, the gothic cross i got in california right after turning 18; it was simple enough to hand over to a stranger on the spot. i decided that we'd stop in at Studio 2 after paying our respects at the apartment, and if i got a good feeling about it, well.
Studio 2 was easy to find, as it was 10 feet away from the candles and silk flowers at bowie's door. a genial french bulldog snarfled up to us, and his person apologized for him from down the hall. sprechen sie englisch? "a bit," he said, and i pulled the rumpled little image out from the bottom of my wallet.
my foreign-tattoo m.o. is pretty complicated: i tend to reach out to the artist or studio i have in mind long before we leave new york, and we become penpals over the course of a few months. i drop by to say hello and chat when we first get into town, a few days before my appointment, and then get whatever lagoon-soaking or intense bathing i'd planned out of the way; then it's tattoo time. this was going to be different, as i hadn't yet settled on a specific design and we were about to leave; the black-metal guys at Studio 1 a) sounded like they weren't interested in any work but their own, which is completely understandable but probably wasn't going to work for me, given time constraints, b) were only in the building by appointment, c) had portfolios with a lot of burning nordic churches in them, which was more than a little intense, and d) seemed like they were into some less-than-egalitarian erotic art featuring ladies? one of Studio 1's artists was in new york the week before we went to berlin and i could have looked him up, but he didn't seem like the guy for me. i didn't even know Studio 2 existed, in turn, until i saw a line on Studio 1's webpage about how people should not go there. its website was pretty generic, but i've learned that plenty of lovely people have a hard time getting their digital shit together (cough). the more i read of bowie's adventures in berlin with iggy pop, brian eno, and tony visconti, the more convinced i became that i needed to embrace their spirit of collaboration and improvisation. some friends of mine got black star tattoos after bowie's death back in january, and the simplicity of that appealed to me. i could fit it below my lowest tattoo, the gothic cross i got in california right after turning 18; it was simple enough to hand over to a stranger on the spot. i decided that we'd stop in at Studio 2 after paying our respects at the apartment, and if i got a good feeling about it, well.
Studio 2 was easy to find, as it was 10 feet away from the candles and silk flowers at bowie's door. a genial french bulldog snarfled up to us, and his person apologized for him from down the hall. sprechen sie englisch? "a bit," he said, and i pulled the rumpled little image out from the bottom of my wallet.
12.07.15
venice is a half-drowned labyrinth, a noble pile of bones, a favorite piece of costume jewelry that turns your wrist green; in late autumn you feel like its only witness and it's the closest you've been to a waking dream, iceland, forgive me. venice is the only part of italy that has ever mattered to me (italy, forgive me); blame henry james for that, maybe, or the dragon asleep at the bottom of the grand canal. i knew for sure that i needed to go when i learned that it is sinking, the acqua alta more fearsome every year. look at that piazza and tell me you don't want to save san marco, or to wave, at least, as the siroccos sweep him under the winter sea.
i decided to give up on not having a tattoo for the black cat i lost and to have one instead. my sister drew him for me, and i sent the drawing to marco, another marco, whose partner spoke enough english to direct me to their gold plaque on an old door around the corner from the old opera house in campo san fantin—la fenice, the phoenix, which burned down in 1774, 1836, and 1996, because of course it did. marco asked if i wanted him to tattoo around a freckle on my back, since if he covered it with ink i wouldn't know if it changed shape and became cancerous one day; he was covering it with a cat who died of cancer, though, and things will happen where they will, now won't they. his english opened up when i complimented the jerry lee lewis he was playing: "he's better than elvis." we're both fans of black metal. "it doesn't matter what language it's in, it's all raaaaugh raaaaugh raaaaugh. i liked that word you used, freckle, it sounds like freak."
venice is a shared secret, dead quiet as you carry your weeping new tattoo over its bridges, down its alleys, like a cartoon character shot through with a cannonball. you always, always drink from the guttering fountains in the twilit squares. you sing old david bowie songs with a leathery regular at the other end of a bar. you visit your sister's handiwork at the biennale, resisting the urge to brag about the original on your back. you don't see a car for five days.
i decided to give up on not having a tattoo for the black cat i lost and to have one instead. my sister drew him for me, and i sent the drawing to marco, another marco, whose partner spoke enough english to direct me to their gold plaque on an old door around the corner from the old opera house in campo san fantin—la fenice, the phoenix, which burned down in 1774, 1836, and 1996, because of course it did. marco asked if i wanted him to tattoo around a freckle on my back, since if he covered it with ink i wouldn't know if it changed shape and became cancerous one day; he was covering it with a cat who died of cancer, though, and things will happen where they will, now won't they. his english opened up when i complimented the jerry lee lewis he was playing: "he's better than elvis." we're both fans of black metal. "it doesn't matter what language it's in, it's all raaaaugh raaaaugh raaaaugh. i liked that word you used, freckle, it sounds like freak."
venice is a shared secret, dead quiet as you carry your weeping new tattoo over its bridges, down its alleys, like a cartoon character shot through with a cannonball. you always, always drink from the guttering fountains in the twilit squares. you sing old david bowie songs with a leathery regular at the other end of a bar. you visit your sister's handiwork at the biennale, resisting the urge to brag about the original on your back. you don't see a car for five days.
01.17.13
a friend of mine tweeted a link to a fine slideshow of tattooed women over at the new yorker's photo department blog this morning. "Anyone riding the Brooklyn L train these days," maria lokke writes, "can see that tattoo culture is thriving, especially among women. In fact, 2012 was the first year in which more women than men were tattooed in the U.S (twenty-three per cent of women, compared with nineteen per cent of men)." lokke then quotes margot mifflin in the introduction to her bodies of subversion: a secret history of women and tattoo: “Tattoos appeal to contemporary women both as emblems of empowerment in an era of feminist gains and as badges of self-determination at a time when controversies about abortion rights, date rape, and sexual harassment have made them think hard about who controls their bodies—and why.”
when i was a senior in high school, a friend and i drove up to los angeles to be tattooed. the little parlor she knew, a hole in the wall at the end of sunset boulevard, didn't ask either of us for ID—which was excellent, since we were both underage. i handed over the eight-pointed star i'd drawn at home after hours on the floor of my bedroom with the liner notes from mellon collie and the infinite sadness, and twenty minutes later its twin and three tiny attendants were weeping black ink into a patch of gauze on the back of my neck. i didn't have a pixie cut in those days, so my star was my secret until i decided to break cover by sweeping my hair up in a bun for a trip to the mall the next week. "hey," my little sister said as she trailed behind me with our mom. "is that real?"
i am more today than a grease spot on the parquet in front of what was robinsons-may's cosmetics department because my mother knew then what self-determination meant to me (i couldn't be pretty or popular, but by god, i could alter myself as i chose: i pierced my ears in front of my mirrored closet door for the first time when i was in fifth grade). she and my father asked me to have the tattoo removed, and they paid for its removal; they even agreed to begin the sessions after winter formal. i got a taste of the life of a tattooed lady in the months between that day at the mall and the afternoon of my last appointment at uc irvine's laser clinic. "so," a sweet-faced classmate asked, "are you a witch?" the dermatologist was more secular: "so, which gang are you in? how drunk were you when this happened?" he hated that i insisted on keeping one of the tiny stars and spoiled the before-and-after photographs in his office album.
i didn't have a car at college, so i got my second tattoo at the shitty redwood city storefront parlor a bus ride away from campus. after paging through illuminated manuscripts in every undergrad library i could access (freshman research papers, if i had shown such love to you!), i chose a cross from a ratty san francisco goth club flyer in my boyfriend's RA's dorm room, and i think i love it more now than i did when i was still recovering from christianity. the artist stopped after forty-five minutes, saying that i was swelling too much and he'd have to finish another time, and when i came back he said his needles had been stolen. i came back again and he himself was gone; they said he'd disappeared with his sketches and receipts. i got a guy at laguna tattoo, the shop on PCH a block from taco loco and just below the vintage shop that sold me my first crushed velvet coat, to finish up the detail work. soon i'll have had it for half my life.
you know the story of my third tattoo, and the story of my fourth is tangled up with the story of our trip to the isle of man, and for another time. why do i tell you these things at all? i surprised myself this morning as i responded to a friend who didn't feel the appeal of tattoos as emblems of female empowerment: "tattooing does feel a bit like the opposite of the powerlessness a gal feels when, say, an ob/gyn refuses to sterilize her," i wrote. i haven't spoken much of my adventures as a woman who knows she doesn't want to have children and it's possible i'll never do so here, but in my case that statement is true: these permanent changes to my body are visceral self-actualization.
funny what a tramp stamp can mean to a girl, innit? it's a passport stamp, as i once told another friend. i can lose faith to experience and firmness to time and stumble out bandaged onto a sidewalk in california or reykjavik or douglas and think my god, what have i done?, but each bit of that ink recalls a birthplace.
when i was a senior in high school, a friend and i drove up to los angeles to be tattooed. the little parlor she knew, a hole in the wall at the end of sunset boulevard, didn't ask either of us for ID—which was excellent, since we were both underage. i handed over the eight-pointed star i'd drawn at home after hours on the floor of my bedroom with the liner notes from mellon collie and the infinite sadness, and twenty minutes later its twin and three tiny attendants were weeping black ink into a patch of gauze on the back of my neck. i didn't have a pixie cut in those days, so my star was my secret until i decided to break cover by sweeping my hair up in a bun for a trip to the mall the next week. "hey," my little sister said as she trailed behind me with our mom. "is that real?"
i am more today than a grease spot on the parquet in front of what was robinsons-may's cosmetics department because my mother knew then what self-determination meant to me (i couldn't be pretty or popular, but by god, i could alter myself as i chose: i pierced my ears in front of my mirrored closet door for the first time when i was in fifth grade). she and my father asked me to have the tattoo removed, and they paid for its removal; they even agreed to begin the sessions after winter formal. i got a taste of the life of a tattooed lady in the months between that day at the mall and the afternoon of my last appointment at uc irvine's laser clinic. "so," a sweet-faced classmate asked, "are you a witch?" the dermatologist was more secular: "so, which gang are you in? how drunk were you when this happened?" he hated that i insisted on keeping one of the tiny stars and spoiled the before-and-after photographs in his office album.
i didn't have a car at college, so i got my second tattoo at the shitty redwood city storefront parlor a bus ride away from campus. after paging through illuminated manuscripts in every undergrad library i could access (freshman research papers, if i had shown such love to you!), i chose a cross from a ratty san francisco goth club flyer in my boyfriend's RA's dorm room, and i think i love it more now than i did when i was still recovering from christianity. the artist stopped after forty-five minutes, saying that i was swelling too much and he'd have to finish another time, and when i came back he said his needles had been stolen. i came back again and he himself was gone; they said he'd disappeared with his sketches and receipts. i got a guy at laguna tattoo, the shop on PCH a block from taco loco and just below the vintage shop that sold me my first crushed velvet coat, to finish up the detail work. soon i'll have had it for half my life.
you know the story of my third tattoo, and the story of my fourth is tangled up with the story of our trip to the isle of man, and for another time. why do i tell you these things at all? i surprised myself this morning as i responded to a friend who didn't feel the appeal of tattoos as emblems of female empowerment: "tattooing does feel a bit like the opposite of the powerlessness a gal feels when, say, an ob/gyn refuses to sterilize her," i wrote. i haven't spoken much of my adventures as a woman who knows she doesn't want to have children and it's possible i'll never do so here, but in my case that statement is true: these permanent changes to my body are visceral self-actualization.
funny what a tramp stamp can mean to a girl, innit? it's a passport stamp, as i once told another friend. i can lose faith to experience and firmness to time and stumble out bandaged onto a sidewalk in california or reykjavik or douglas and think my god, what have i done?, but each bit of that ink recalls a birthplace.
04.19.11
101 in 1001 {II}: 024 get another tattoo [completed 03.29.11]
welcome to my life, tattoo! we've a long time together, me and you.
(should you find yourself in reykjavik in need of ink, sindri at Ãslenzka húðflúrstofan is a capital fellow.)
101 in 1001 {II}: 024 get another tattoo [completed 03.29.11]
welcome to my life, tattoo! we've a long time together, me and you.
(should you find yourself in reykjavik in need of ink, sindri at Ãslenzka húðflúrstofan is a capital fellow.)
03.21.11
what ho, my dears! in about fifty hours, the missus and i will wing our way from NYC to iceland; i've been devouring guidebooks, practicing my wintery rolled Rs, freshening up my loudest clothing, and working like mad to finish war and peace, for there's no way i'm bringing that mother across the atlantic. i've also finally gotten serious about tattoo-in-reykjavik planning; i made my appointment a month ago, but i'd stalled on paging through snow crystals and deciding which of w.a. bentley's little darlings is to be inked. i finally made the second round of cuts last night, and it was rough: choosing the loveliest snowflake of all sounds like the finest job ever, but there were two thousand of them. i'm now down to eight.
{background: wilson bentley was a farmer and self-taught photomicrography pioneer who figured out how to photograph single snowflakes by mashing up a microscope and a bellows camera; he took the first of these photographs in 1885. a bentley snowflake is just symmetrical enough, a fitting reminder of my eight years of wanting this trip, and most of all, a product of outsider enthusiasm. what up, my hobbyist.}
{more background: the snowflake tattoo will be about 3" in diameter, inked in black, and just above this 4" cross. know that if you follow that link you will see a back.}
so. which beautiful and unique snowflake should i, you know, reproduce?
what ho, my dears! in about fifty hours, the missus and i will wing our way from NYC to iceland; i've been devouring guidebooks, practicing my wintery rolled Rs, freshening up my loudest clothing, and working like mad to finish war and peace, for there's no way i'm bringing that mother across the atlantic. i've also finally gotten serious about tattoo-in-reykjavik planning; i made my appointment a month ago, but i'd stalled on paging through snow crystals and deciding which of w.a. bentley's little darlings is to be inked. i finally made the second round of cuts last night, and it was rough: choosing the loveliest snowflake of all sounds like the finest job ever, but there were two thousand of them. i'm now down to eight.
{background: wilson bentley was a farmer and self-taught photomicrography pioneer who figured out how to photograph single snowflakes by mashing up a microscope and a bellows camera; he took the first of these photographs in 1885. a bentley snowflake is just symmetrical enough, a fitting reminder of my eight years of wanting this trip, and most of all, a product of outsider enthusiasm. what up, my hobbyist.}
{more background: the snowflake tattoo will be about 3" in diameter, inked in black, and just above this 4" cross. know that if you follow that link you will see a back.}
so. which beautiful and unique snowflake should i, you know, reproduce?
01.21.11: the dirty dozen {twelve things i plan to do in iceland}
i started envisioning my dream trip to iceland more than eight years ago. i booked that mother eight minutes ago, and we leave for reykjavik on march 23rd.
01 acquire a vegvÃsir tattoo*
02 gorge on icelandic design
03 see the northern lights
04 visit eyjafjallajökull and rough it up for cara and nye
05 hoard kulur and adorable detritus from bolludagur
06 lurk like a snow monkey in the blue lagoon (pre-tattoo)
07 bathe in a large vat of mud (ditto)
08 visit the national museum of iceland
09 have a bun at bæjarins beztu
10 admire puffins
11 try brennivin
12 organize elves
ever so much more on this in future posts.
i started envisioning my dream trip to iceland more than eight years ago. i booked that mother eight minutes ago, and we leave for reykjavik on march 23rd.
01 acquire a vegvÃsir tattoo*
02 gorge on icelandic design
03 see the northern lights
04 visit eyjafjallajökull and rough it up for cara and nye
05 hoard kulur and adorable detritus from bolludagur
06 lurk like a snow monkey in the blue lagoon (pre-tattoo)
07 bathe in a large vat of mud (ditto)
08 visit the national museum of iceland
09 have a bun at bæjarins beztu
10 admire puffins
11 try brennivin
12 organize elves
ever so much more on this in future posts.
*as gracie wisely notes, the ol' viking compass says "metaphysical bookstore patron" in a way i don't appreciate nearly as much as my earlytwentysomething iceland-envisioning counterpart did. working tattoo plan as of now: a wilson bentley snowflake.
12.24.09: welcome to my life
1: you wouldn't get a matching tattoo with me?
2: winona forever.
1: they wouldn't have to say anything. they could be awesome barn owl tattoos.
2: i just don't like tattoos.
1: so you're saying you married me in spite of mine?
2: yes.
1: i know what my next tattoo is going to say.
1: you wouldn't get a matching tattoo with me?
2: winona forever.
1: they wouldn't have to say anything. they could be awesome barn owl tattoos.
2: i just don't like tattoos.
1: so you're saying you married me in spite of mine?
2: yes.
1: i know what my next tattoo is going to say.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)