Tattoos … Skin Art?

Tattoos … Skin Art?

Apparently the English word tattoo was swiped from the Polynesians and their word, which was tatue.  The English sailors who first encountered Pacific island cultures were fascinated by the skin markings of different islanders. 

What Europeans apparently had a difficult task with comprehending, understanding, accepting that anyone would permanently mark their skin.  I don’t know, to me if you live in a place where you don’t … like ever, need to wear clothes, why not?  Before the Christian missionaries came galumphing into the more moderate climates and making everybody ashamed of being naked, why force people to wear stuff they are just going to have to wash all the time.

Human beings and, I think horses, sweat.  Among mammals, sweating is kind of unusual.  But when you’re basically hairless, evolution says you have to protect your outer skin layers somehow.  And, your inner temperature, or you’ll cook – which would come just before … oh I don’t know … dying.  Which is something we all want to avoid, most of the time, until we just have to.

So tattoos and being naked; the whole concept does cause a person to wonder, who came up with the idea and why?  I have learned (from the Discovery Channel) that in Africa various indigenous peoples used skin art as a way of identifying members of their own group, or community, or tribe(?) from a distance.  You have the wrong piece of Art on your face, chest, wherever, and you might get a smartly thrown spear in you – somewhere.

This rule would keep territory and order in order.  Kind of like a driver’s license, except that you couldn’t loose it, or put it through the laundry, making it all limp or  melted.  A real properly done tattoo isn’t going to come off and you aren’t going to loose it.  Anyway, it seems like a good system to me, when there is a serious need.

You know just by looking at a person who belongs where, maybe if they are married or not, or have a lot of community status or wealth, or if they are lost and need a spear in them.  Could save a lot of time and confusion.

I have seen some really beautiful and cool tattoo artwork.  And I have seen some that bring to mind, you must have been really drunk, dude!  Low self-esteem … something.  A tweetybird on your neck?  (You know from the old cartoons, Tweetybird and Sylvester the cat – never mind.  It’s stupid yellow bird with tiny wings and a huge head.)  I have seen that on a real person’s neck. 

Then I knew this guy, when I was in the Army, who went on a weekend leave and came back with a dagger that had a scroll wrapped around it that said, “Death Befor Dishonor”.  Seriously.  Not only spelled wrong, but the dagger wasn’t even very straight.  Very primitive, like maybe the tattoo artist was also drunk.  What a mess, and he had to live with it stuck there on his forearm forever.  Fortunately, in those days in the Army, we weren’t allowed to roll our sleeves up.

I’ve had a number of crashes on my bike and my left shoulder is pretty scarred up.  I’ve often thought about getting a tattoo to cover that up, so I don’t have to explain it every summer when I go to the beach.  But nothing so far … and no earrings either.  I have enough trouble with the old man hair growing in my ears – that feels like I have ants crawling around in there – without some other thing stuck in my earlobe. 

Still I think the tattoos that are done by skilled artists are kind of cool.  It would take some real commitment, and some heavy cash as I understand it, to go have a really good tattoo done.  I’m here in my town office, Starbucks, and a lady is getting coffee (what else?).  She’s wearing shorts and has a bunch of tattoos on her lower legs.  None of them seem related to the others.  Just sort of scattered higgly-piggly here and there. 

Then there is other lady, also wearing shorts, with tattoos on her legs that look like she really thought about it.  Actual Artistic compositions.  Completely all the way around her calves, like socks, or something.  Somehow that kind of works.  I have a number of friends who are black and have tattoos that are well done and also seem to work for them.  Kind of monochromatic, but done right, it works.

So I’m not judging – really. 

It’s just that getting up every morning and when I’m shaving, seeing that tweetybird, on my damn neck, staring back me – every morning – would drive me just nuts.