The Things that We Carry for our Lives

9/16/2014 change , pain 0 Comments

I got a tattoo! Or should I express myself more clearly, I payed someone to mutilate my epiderme with striking fast mechanical needles that inject a black oily ink in my dermi and as it goes in, blood comes out. Liters. I never thought I would experience pain in other levels since it usually just hurts. I got plenty of time coping with it: I relaxed all my muscles and let it dissolve in my body, sometimes I tried the opposite and contract all my muscles and concentrate the feeling at precisely the needle point and nothing else, other times I just relied on my phone to distract me, listen to the chit-chat of the other customers and their own pain, I even caught myself humming to the sound of the machine in some kind of escapism trance. I hope nobody saw that last part tough.

After two hours of this intense mental effort, two short smoke breaks and two chocolates for lunch, it was done. It was beautiful and it's first picture was on the social media. The adrenaline afterwards was also skyhigh! I was so hyped, so alive, I was walking everywhere in the streets of Amsterdam! Eventually it wore off and it was replaced by exhaustion and a sunburn sensation drawn on my leg. I collapsed and slept like a rock on the train back home.

Now I'll carry this drawing, proudly with me, and all it represents, for life. A drawing that is at the same time much more than what people think but also much less. Now, after the deed is done, I realise that it is two things at the same time: It is just another funky drawing in just another skinny leg. But it also portraits some part of me, now in form of graphics in my flesh. If anyone is interested enough, I promise it's a worthy subject. Specially if I feel inspired by telling the whole story.


There are many things we carry for our lives and like it or not they make us who we are. It defines us, put boundaries, describes, make us truly unique and make us connect to each other. Most of the time we can't even decide by our selves what to carry and not. Life just makes us carry it. Part of what I carry is now represented as a tattoo and somehow, it feels the burden is a bit lighter to carry.