If you’d asked me one year ago if I ever dreamed of getting married, the look you would have gotten could have answered your ridiculous question before you finished asking it. I have trouble with promises. It’s just *not possible* to know how you’ll feel in the future.
But I think I had it all wrong. And this is an aspect of the BG that I’ve come to admire, adore and continually aspire to integrate into an ever-changing me. He lives in the moment.
Not even a month after I met him, the BG told me he thought we should get tattoos together. I don’t remember my exact reaction, but it was probably something in between a polite brush-off and a sudden freak-out. It scared the shit out of me. And during all the months of excitement, traveling, loving, debunking my relationship woes, I was still shoving that little idea he had to the very dark, dank corner of my mind so I could sleep at night. I mean, is this kid even for real? Wtf?
But… am *I* for real? I left a dream situation in my dream city to come back to the east coast to live in a shoebox with someone I’d only known for seven effing months.
Yea.
The idea of the tattoos has casually been discussed here and there since I moved to Raleigh but I needed to make a decision on what it meant to *me* so that I can come to terms with getting something permanently inked on my body with a significant other. I needed it to mean something personal so that no matter where I am in my mind I never regret the decision for a moment.
Last week, I did the best I could. And our one year thingy rolled by last Monday and we were both like, What should we do to celebrate?
I said let’s go get tattooed.
Here is what the Fuchsia Blossom tattoo symbolizes to me:
- The first plant (of many) the BG gave to me to decorate my house in Portland.
- A love that has opened my eyes during a period of monumental self-change.
- That tattoos are permanent, and ideas (thoughts, attitudes, habits, judgements, decisions) are not.
- The day I took a blossom from the plant and put it in the hand of a blind man as we got off the bus on my way to work. (A day I felt a pure goodness inside which made me very happy.)
- That I now believe in fighting for something other than just *me*.
- That each moment is all I have. No more, no less.
Just as the Four Agreements tattoo serves as a reminder to do my best, the Fuchsia Blossom tattoo reminds me to live in the moment.
Pics of the Fuchsia Blossom tattoos. :)
