Live Life With No Ragrets!
LECHEROUS ADVICE
Dear Lech,
How can I live my life with less ragrets? -Regratful1
Ahh, the taste of spring is starting to tingle on our tongues. Soon it will be appropriate to take off our layers of clothing and walk freely with our un-airbrushed skin for all to judge. Self confidence and don’t-give-a-fuckness is important here. You may not be the sexiest thing on the planet, but if you own that shit, we’ll all be left slightly perplexed and intimidated.
That brings me to one of my favorite subjects of study, the art of the tattoo. Lines of ink inserted into the canvas of open framed skin. I dig them. I got a few of my own. They’re paintings from the 17th century from shoulder to shoulder all along my back. That’s right, I’m a cool son of a bitch like that. But, some unfortunate souls have made the terrible mistake of going with what was popular at the time or what their associates were rocking that year. Fat line, sailor art, prison ink blue, barbells, tramp stamps, orchids, koi fish, and Samoan tribal tattoos all come to mind.
There is a big tattoo convention coming to Chicago here in a couple weeks. You have these too in your city, it just might be a small sworee at the local liquor store on the heart of Saturday night. Tom Waits mentioned something about that. Here we expose our inner decisions of indiscretion to each other, feeling most comfortable with those who have like-minded drudgery. Live with no ragrets! That shit may be stupid as hell, but at least you had the balls to do it.
Explanations for not having any range from uncertainty, perfectionism, body altering fear, religious reasons, lack of time, and getting “too old” for that sort of foolishness. I get it. Sort of. Kinda like that one time I decided to mosh pit at a Gogol Bordello concert and proceeded to lose both shoes and have massive heart palpitations from the head trauma and constant accordion riffs. Hmm, ehh, I’m glad I got the scars and ear ringing tinnitus to remind me though.
And that’s exactly it friends. If this life is truly intended to be lived with vigor, then you have to go out there on the limb and make some truly questionable decisions that would drive your mamas crazy. Push that line and bend those rules so that you get a taste of the wild side. It is definitely tasty. Sorta like chocolate flavored cactus peyote.
Hurts a bit, but that kind of dopamine and serotonin is hard to mimic. Enjoy those leering judging eyes this summer season coming up, and the ones afterwards. Get a tattoo finally will ya? Believe me, deep down, those clean skin chicken shits all wish they had balls like you.
