16 steps to getting your first tattoo

Remember the first time you wanted a tattoo. You were in your 20s, it was some time in the late 90s or early 2000s. Tattoos hadn’t yet exploded into the mainstream. You wanted barbed wire inked around your bicep.

Be thankful you didn’t give into that impulse.

Take pride in not having any tattoos well into your 40s. At some point it felt like it was counter culture to have ink-free skin.

As you approach 50, go on a mid-life journey. Not a crisis. You’re not in crisis, but you are reflective and want to be intentional about how you want to live and experience the world after the mid-life hump.

Start a documentary that takes almost three years to make that sees you digging into your cultural and ancestral roots and facing your demons about being a Filipino in Canada.

Admit to yourself that it’s shame. Shame about your brown skin and where you come from is what you’ve been feeling this whole time. It’s why you’ve always aligned yourself with “whiteness” and kept your distance from newcomer Filipinos (they just didn’t get it).

Go to the Philippines and meet family you haven’t seen in 40 years and have no memories of. Feel like an outsider in the country you came from with people who look like you.

Learn about the Philippines history of being colonized for over 300 years by Spain and then by the US until just after WWII ends.

Take pride in the resiliency and culture of your people. Shed the shame you’ve carried your whole life.

Decide that, yes, you want a tattoo again. And you want it to commemorate this transformational journey you’ve been on, because you know that’s something that you’ll carry for the rest of your life.

Through a random chain of events, meet the artist who will eventually design and give you your tattoo. You chose her because of her kind and gentle spirit. You trusted that she would take your rough ideas and turn them into a work of art.

Choose the elements of the tattoo:

1. a Narra tree with roots (which is the national tree of the Philippines and whose hardwood symbolizes strength and resiliency; its roots ground you and remind you where you’re from)

2. The sun from the Philippines flag (which represents freedom and independence after 300 years of being colonized by Spain)

3. a maple leaf (to honour the country you were born in and raised, and love)

Get nervous on the day, but realize it’s not so bad once she starts. The excellent conversation is a great distraction from the pain.

Realize later that no one ever talks about the healing process of tattoos, which you find way harder to deal with than the actual tattoo process. The itchiness at times is almost unbearable.

Look at your tattoo all the time.

Write a blog post about your tattoo.