[scar]ed

As I was getting undressed to take a shower one day, I caught a glimpse of my tattoo in the mirror. Emblazoned on my left shoulder, the heart design- one side an angel’s wing, the other twisted thorns- looked strangely distorted. The wing was suddenly childish and amateur; the thorns were messy, jumbled and horrid. It just looked ugly.

I thought to myself: “Oh god, why did I get this thing?”

I’ve had people, in public and at parties, approach me and comment on my tattoo. I am always asked, “What does it mean?” I tell them that it is in memory of somebody who passed away.

In actuality, it is a little more than that.

What most people don’t notice is the date that is inscribed in the middle feather of the angel’s wing. 7-31-1997.

That’s the day that my life- and I- really did change forever.

I rarely talk about my childhood, but I especially do not bring up that I am the child of a suicide victim. It makes people uncomfortable. I’ve also gotten pretty annoyed with people deciding that they automatically know what kind of person I am based on that little factoid alone, and people’s pity also drives me insane.

Therefore, I never talk about it.

In fact, I don’t even think about it very much. It would be an understatement to say that my mother’s suicide changed me for good. She passed her demons onto me- her thorns- and having to deal with those adult-sized things at seven years old ended my childhood immediately.

And while she is, in theory, my guardian angel now, I still hold resentment toward her, basically, ruining my life. Ruining me.

Most little girls want to grow up to be just like their mommy. Growing up to be just like my mother means I will be dead. Do you see why I don’t think about this very often?

And yet, I have those years of pain, those demons, that resentment permanently etched into my skin. My mental and emotional scars have manifested into a physical one, directly behind my heart. Why?

Because, as angry as I may be almost 14 years later, there is no denying that her death is why I am here, in Sonoma, now. Despite the almost unbearable pain she put me through, that same pain made me a hell of a lot more independent and, for lack of a better word, tough. That pain made me- well, me.

I believe everybody has similar pain. Moments or events they will never think or speak of again. There’s that song, “Every Rose Has Its Thorn.” Perhaps the opposite is true: every thorn may also be the chance for a flower to bloom.

My tattoo is a daily reminder of what I try to forget. It scares others- and it terrifies me- but it why I am writing this now. It has led me here and it will lead me to wherever I end up in this life.

For that reason alone, it will never be ugly.