OMG! My daughter has a tattoo!  And it’s not a tiny butterfly discreetly hidden on her shoulder.

I don’t think there is a butterfly anywhere on her arm.  Oh, did I mention that my daughter’s tattoo covers her entire arm?  It’s called a sleeve. 

Yes,  my daughter who never even went Goth during her adolescence and prefers classic-style clothing, has a freaking tattoo sleeve on her right arm.  And there’s more to fill in. 

Instead of a dainty rose on her shoulder, the talons of a large fluttering-winged raven hold down an asp which is part of an oak tree.  Recently she added a hummingbird at her elbow.  “And then,” she begins, “this will tie into art that works down to my wrist….” as my eyes begin that glazed-over stare and I mumble to myself why tattoos?

This is the daughter I often refer to as “chef daughter” – Chef Dakota Weiss.  She’s a talented 30-something executive chef who cooked up an impressive career sautéing with the likes of Chefs Mark Miller and Bruno Menard.  She is an artist and there is no surprise about her bare-skinned art.

Tattoos are no longer the realm of drunken sailors and beefy girls on motorcycles.  I know that! But, OMG! My daughter has a tattoo!

Tattoos are old business.  They stained the flesh of 2000 BC Egyptian women.  The tattooed mummified ladies were found in royal and elite burials. Dotted patterns and lines were the tattoo of choice.   Did I forget to mention the tattoo dotted patterns and lines that run down my daughter’s back?

Yes, Dakota has tattoos spreading like spilled ink over her body.

So what?  Tattoos needle history in nearly every culture. It’s time I exchange the image of a hairy arm reading I Love Mom inked over a bleeding heart, to a new perspective:  tattoos are art and committed statements.

I once thought about getting tattoos around my eyes. I’d no longer wake up looking half-dead and I’d save money too. I wouldn’t have to buy eyeliner for the rest of my life.  But it didn’t happen because my imagination went off with scenarios that included a possible earthquake while the tattoo artist was lining my eyes and the needle would slip and poke my eye out. 

I don’t know what Dakota thought about during the 4.5 hours it took to needle in the raven, asp and oak tree inks.  Her mother, on the other hand, avoids annual flu shots because of that needle business.

Truthfully, for several years Dakota explored her future tattoo sleeve.  “Mom, it will be so cool. I’ve researched this for quite a while.  Nearest to my heart is the raven, which  is you with your talons over the asp, which is me, because I’m the one who needs you to watch over me and keep me on the right path…and then…”  She goes on to explain the tree and how it represents her sister, and the leaves… and I went teary-eyed thinking that my daughter is so devoted to her family that she would create this art piece on her body without fear.

OMG! My daughter has a tattoo!  I love it.