Number 8 - 11
Thursday, April 26 : 2:53 PM : 0 comments :
Four Elements[ April 19 & 20, 2007 ] - Back
It seems like every year or so, around the New Year, I itch to get a new tattoo. My last one was in February 2006 and since then I've been plotting to get sleeves. Of course, if you're going to get (half-)sleeves, you better be able to pay for it, you better have a good design, and you better make sure your future jobs won't require you to hide anything. Well, due to the events and realizations of last week, all those barriers are gone. I'm ready to get tatted up; stylishly, of course.
I had seven tattoos, now I have eleven (sort of). Pretty much, all my tattoos are tiny and maybe combined they make one "real" tattoo. But I like it that way. I mean, I'm pretty skinny, I only have so much real estate. Right?
It's an addiction, tattooing. I wish I could actually tattoo but until then, I've decided that I need to just keep returning to tried and true artists. Marty from Avalon Tattoo did my first two tattoos and those were done so cleanly that I wanted him, and only him, to do these latest four. I've had a bad experience with two tattoos once (three if you count George's) and I decided that you get what you pay for. Even then, you should overpay just to make sure that you're getting exactly what you want. Most of my designs are super generic and simple; so it's about clean lines and perfect execution.
Anyway, enough of that. This time around, I jumped down to San Diego and was ready to get tattooed right away. My mind was moving super fast and I decided on what I wanted within mere moments of seeing it. It just fit. The design? Ambigrams of "Air, Earth, Fire, Water" from Dan Brown's Angels & Demons. Reading Da Vinci Code partly inspired me to get my first tattoo (the explanations of the power of symbols, not the actual book) and I thought this would be fitting. Jmz was working on turning those four words into customized ambigrams -- and his designs looked pretty awesome -- but in the end, I always go with the most generic iteration of symbol so I figured why mess with success?
What do these four elements represent? A whole bunch of things. The playing card suits we're all so familiar with are based on the Tarot's Minor Arcana. Swords(Spades) and Cups(Hearts) are associated with the Air and Water elements respectively. Wands(Clubs) and Pentacles(Diamonds) are Fire and Earth. I love Tarot, I've studied it and played around with it as a fun little diversion. The art and story behind the cards are fantastic. I just bought a (Chinese themed) Tarot deck; let's divine.The four elements could represent The Fantastic Four, the First Family of superheroes. Mr Fantastic, Invisible Woman, Human Torch, and The Thing have their powers based around the four elements. Water, Air, Fire, Earth. You see?
It could mean I like Earth, Wind & Fire's "September," which I do. Or it could be states of matter: solid, liquid, gas, and plasma.
Traditionally in Chinese ideology, there are five elements. Wood, Fire, Earth, Metal, and Water. I thought about putting those somewhere, but I already have the pentagram on my back, and nothing says "5" like a star. Plus I don't want Chinese characters on my body, just Chinese art and landscapes if I can afford it.
In Western philosophy, the four elements arrayed on my back also have a fifth, aether or quintessence, of which the cosmos itself is made. In Brown's book, the four ambigrams Vultron together to form the Illuminati Diamond, which is the object of everyone's fear and lust. Throw your diamonds in the sky if you feel the vibe.
Sidenote: Dan Brown's ambigram designer, John Langdon has a book and website, it's amazing. I guess he's also the designer of my tattoos too.
Another answer? The Four Elements of Hip Hop: Graffiti, DJ-ing, MC-ing, and B-Boying. I have no idea if they correlate to the actual element words, but who cares? We see the correlation of numbers every day. If you wanted to look for instances of "213" you would see them everywhere. The brain is designed to collect, associate, and process patterns. And numbers like 2, 3, 5, 7, have powerful meanings in any culture, field of study, or three-dimensional world.
Those are all things I associate with the new tattoos I got. But here's the thing, the elements for me, are a cross. A Christian cross. Almost all of my tattoos are some sort of religious symbol and I swore that I would never put Christ's cross on my body until I was ready to be at peace with Abrahamic religions -- Christianity especially. I won't delve into my reasoning behind that but suffice to say, I have a hate/love relationship with the Holy Christ. But last week, I squashed that. I'm not a Christian, nor do I wish to be one; but I no longer fight it. Thus, I was ready to put the cross on my back. Because nobody can bear it alone, much less me."One night I dreamed I was walking along the beach with the Lord. Many scenes from my life flashed across the sky.
In each scene I noticed footprints in the sand. Sometimes there were two sets of footprints, other times there was one only.
This bothered me because I noticed that during the low periods of my life, when I was suffering from anguish, sorrow or defeat, I could see only one set of footprints, so I said to the Lord,
'You promised me Lord, that if I followed you, you would walk with me always. But I have noticed that during the most trying periods of my life there has only been one set of footprints in the sand. Why, when I needed you most, have you not been there for me?'
The Lord replied, 'The years when you have seen only one set of footprints, my child, is when I carried you.'"
"Everybody's free, everybody's free, everybody's free
Everybody's free, everybody's free, to feel good, to feel good
Brother and sister together will make it through
Someday a spirit will take you and guide you there
I know you've been hurting ,but I've been waiting to be there for you
And I'll be there, just helping you out whenever I can"
-Everybody's Free-
Labels: Tattoos
