I have many tattoos, and I love them all! I love to ask people for their “tattoo stories.” It doesn’t matter if it’s a fun design you got on a lark, a matching tattoo with a paramour, or a design that means the world to you! I love to hear the inspiration behind others’ tattoos. Here are a few of mine!
One of the dearest to my heart is a sad clown girl on the back of my calf. This tattoo is special A) because it was my very first tattoo with color in it, and B) it actually helped me get over a fear. I have been afraid of clowns my entire life. I have no idea why. I woke up one day and decided to love clowns. I was going to lean into it hard. Cue a year of collecting vintage clown dolls and finally getting a tattoo to immortalize my silly little journey.
Next, there is a thylacine on my thigh. This extinct meat-eating marsupial lived in Tasmania, and was hunted into extinction by careless people. I’ve always had a fascination with extinct animals, but the thylacine captured my heart. Their tale was uniquely tragic: mass killings of livestock led these animals to be the suspected culprits. A bounty was placed on their pelts, and they were hunted in droves. It was later proven that wild dogs had been killing livestock, and thylacines had had nothing to do with it. A wave of poorly-timed disease later, they were all but decimated. They were strange-looking — a jaw that could open to a 120 degree angle, stripes like a tiger, a head like a wolf, a gait like a dog. They were freaks of nature uniquely adapted to their environment. They were misjudged and it led to their demise. My heart aches for them on the daily. I’ve been obsessed with them since I was ten years old, and this tattoo was the culmination of eleven years of love for a tragic animal.
Lastly, there is my Rocky Horror tribute tattoo, my favorite lyric surrounded by roses. These roses match tattoos four of us in my friend group received from an unlikely friend with a tattoo gun. I have been performing in the Clinton Street Cabaret’s Rocky Horror Picture Show since I was eighteen years old, and this show is my life. The friends and partners I have gained through this show have been the best. I love them all so dearly. The memories I’ve made and continue to make are so special to me. The lyric, “Rose tint my world” is how I prefer to see life. I want to look at the world through rose-tinted glasses. I want to see only the best in life. I want endless joy and debauchery. And this musical, and those people, are the closest thing I have to a rose-tinted world.