Day 78: Get A Basement Tattoo

A skateboarding gnarwhal 

      Anybody remember day 7(http://aimforeclouds.blogspot.com/2011/01/day-7-stick-n-poke.html)? I do. I remember I was one week deep into the project and I wanted to commemorate my 7-day-streak with a good ol' stick n' poke tattoo. Since then, I've done a whole heap load of new things. I've done anything from donate blood to make guacamole. And so, I guess I thought it was time to revisit the stick n' poke challenge, but in a new way. Thats right, I let my friend Mac (who is in no way a professional tattoo artist) ink me. He had bought a tattoo starter kit off amazon a couple days earlier and has been messing with it since. Being the trustworthy friend that I am, I let him tattoo a little skateboard along the outside edge of  my right foot. He's a talented artist and has an eye for detail, so I trusted him. Before me, he had done only one other tattoo, and that was on himself. He embedded the image of something called a "gnarwhal" on his thigh a few days before. To get the idea of what a gnarwhal looks like, just imagine an bloated aquatic unicorn-cow hybrid. I don't really get the fascination with these sea cow things but, to each his own. His tat looked good and so it was my turn to go under the needle.

Mindless Rant, Reading is Optional

 I came up with the idea of having the board on my foot so I could always be able to think of my self as being on my skateboard, regardless of how corny that sounds. I like it. I like to be able to think of myself skating, even when I'm not. Skateboarding is probably the one aspect in my life that I consider to be truly mine. Its my thing, no matter how mainstream it gets. I'm free to go where I want and try what I want. Theres no rules, there is no right way in skating. Its one of those things where I've tried countless times to express how I feel about skating to people that don't skate, and they just don't get it. And I understand, really I do. Why should someone believe me when I tell them that some of the best days of my life were simply days where I wondered around town by myself on my board? Why should they take notice of kids like me jumping down stairs and risking major testicular injury when skating a rail? That OK, I don't expect you to get it. I try to explain to people that skateboarding changes you, it gives you a new way to look at things. I think it keeps you a kid. The world is a playground, but adults, for one reason or another, choose to forget that. Skating has given me the ability to see opportunities in things that others don't even register. When I get kicked out of spots or ticketed for skating, the authority figure usually says something along the lines of, "Why?". As if they are offended that someone like me would waste so much time and energy to throw my life away for doing a couple kickflips. They ask why cause they're confused, they don't get it. Thats the beautiful thing about skating, theres nothing to get. Its all yours, you decide everything. And to answer the authority figures question, "Why not?". I feel that skateboarding is as much of an art form (if not more than) as painting or sculpture. I'll rant about this to anyone who will listen, and I get shit for it every time I do. Simply put, skateboarding is an art because: You do whatever the hell you want. If you feel like skating in the middle of a cornfield in the middle of Kansas, you can. If you feel like you want to ollie off the top of the grand canyon (its been done), you can. If you feel like you want to skate without wheels, you can. All I'm trying to say is, skateboarding is as free and unrestrained as any other art form, and I'll argue that point till I'm blue in the face.

OK, back to the story

I'm on my skateboard!

     I'll make this quick cause I doubt any of you are actually reading all of this rambling. So I got the tat on the foot and it wasn't the greatest feeling in the world. Unfortunately, the tat ended up kind of on the bottom of my foot so its not very visible and it will probably wear off in like six months, but I like it anyways. Ummm, any more random blurbs I could throw into this extremely long blog? I guess the fact that gnarwhals look like bloated sea uni-cows and that skateboarding is the funnest thing I have ever done would have summed it up.