Tattoos I Know: Beth's Ink Ushers in the New Baseball Season

Well, folks, it's March 31, which means several things, First and foremost, after a long, cold winter, and a rough start to spring, baseball season starts today. And although, the last time I checked, there was a 70% chance of rain for the New York Yankees home opener against the Detroit Tigers today, baseball fans everywhere are just a tad excited that their team's 162 game-long drama is about to begin.

So, it seemed fitting that we share this tattoo, belonging to our cousin Beth:

Photo by Melanie Cohen

Beth is a diehard Yankees fan and she got this inked on September 16, 2005. For the record, the Yankees beat the Toronto Blue Jays north of the border that day 11-10 thanks, in part, to two Robinson Cano home runs and Mariano Rivera's 40th save of the year.

This is one of Beth's three tattoos, a fact not lost on me, as I have been wanting to post her ink on the site ever since we started back in 2007. However, we just never got around to it and this photo was shot last June in New Jersey by my wife, Melanie, at another cousin's baby shower. I thought, at the time, that we would save this picture for the day the Yankees won the World Series, but last year that ambition fell short in the ALCS. So we saved it for Opening Day, instead.

The tattoo was done by Thomi Hawk at K & B Tattooing & Piercing in Hightstown, New Jersey.

I should also add that, back in August 2007, I was sitting in my seat at PNC Bank Arts Center, between sets, when I noticed a very similar tattoo several rows ahead of me. I thought, "Man, that tattoo looks just like Beth's, and in the same spot [on her upper right back] too!" Of course, it was Beth, and we were both unaware that we were attending the show. And to think I spotted her in all that humanity by noticing her tattoo!

I mentioned at the top of the post that it being March 31, meant several things. Aside from Opening Day, it's also opening day for the inkspotting season, as far as I'm concerned. Posts have been few and far between over the past few months and that's about to change. Tomorrow begins National Poetry Month, and we will be embarking on our third annual Tattooed Poets Project: 30 days of tattoos from poets across the country. And, I will assume, that I'll be having regular Tattoosday encounters, which will reappear in May, throughout the month.

Play ball!

Thanks again to Beth for sharing her cool patriotic Yankees tattoo with us here on Tattoosday!

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This entry is ©2011 Tattoosday.


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Tattoos I Know: Paul's Taíno Ink

Last summer, my friend Paul had some new work done by Pierre at The Fort Apache Tattoo Studio near Penn Station. You can see some of his old work here and here and here and here (yes, he's a regular!).

Fort Apache is up several flights of stairs, but it is conveniently close to my day job, which makes up for the aerobic ascension to the shop on 31st Street.

This is what Paul had tattooed on his right forearm:

These four symbols are petroglyphs from the Taíno culture in Puerto Rico. They are one way Paul has chosen to acknowledging his and his ancestors' culture, in ink.

From top to bottom, the symbols each have literal meanings, and then personal meanings for Paul. The triangular piece is a zemis, pointing in three directions - to the sky and the Creator, to the underworld and the realm of the dead, and to the world of the living.

The second petroglyph is Sol, or the sun and the fourth design is the coqui, or frog.

Thanks once again to Paul for sharing his latest installment of ink here with us on Tattoosday!

Tattoos I Love: Melanie's Hybrid Flower

This is another special edition of Tattoosday, a variation on the Tattoos I Know series. First seen on Valentine's Day, this is an episode of Tattoos I Love.

This category is reserved for the ink on my wife, Melanie, who turns 40 today.

Several years ago, I bought her a gift certificate for Body Art Studios in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn. The owner and artist, Peter Cavorsi, is a talented tattooer, and he proved it in this case.

Melanie's favorite flower is the iris. She wanted something pretty along those lines, and gave Peter a couple of samples of artwork as a reference.

What he came up with was a lovely interpretation of the iris, but with other floral elements thrown in. So, although based on her favorite flower, it is a hybrid that is uniquely hers:


I surreptitiously snapped this photo of the tattoo on her right ankle last year at a little league game in which our younger daughter was playing.

Work from Peter at Body Art Studios has appeared previously on Tattoosday here.

Happy Birthday, Melanie!

A Love Story

Last Saturday night, Melanie and I went into Manhattan for a small holiday gathering. We were going to see her old high school friend Vibeke at her mother's apartment on the Upper West Side. It had been quite some time since we had last seen Vibeke. We weren't sure, but our best guess was 1998.

Vibeke had been living in Los Angeles, had recently married and moved to Houston. It was great seeing her again, and it was nice meeting her husband Matt.

Invariably, Melanie asked Vibeke how she and Matt had met. She explained that, in the early '90s, she had been living on a boat in St. John, in the U.S. Virgin Islands. For a while, the only way she could get to shore from the boat where it was moored was to swim. I'm guessing she also occasionally hitched a ride on someone's dinghy, but her primary shore-to-ship mode of transport was her own arms and legs.

As one would imagine, this proved to be problematic. So she invested in an inflatable dinghy and a small outboard motor to more practically transport her to and from dry land.

When the motor developed a problem, she took it into a shop for repairs. A gentleman named Matt was the proprietor and he repaired it. A little tension developed when, as Vibeke tells it, the repairs were less than satisfactory. More work was done, apparently to her standards and from this initial meeting, a romance blossomed.

After six months, Vibeke decided, for various reasons, that she would return to the states and move on with her life. The relationship with Matt abruptly ended.

Cut to the cinematic technique of a calender shedding pages like a tree in autumn, as time passed.

Then 9/11 happened. This prompted many Americans to feel the need to check in with past acquaintances and such. Vibeke looked for Matt, but he has a common last name and she couldn't find him. She was having, and continued to have, "where is he now" moments. She never found him.

But he found her.

Earlier this year, she was proctoring a test for students at a public school in Southern California where she was teaching. The phone rang.

It was Matt. He was beside himself. He had found her. Vibeke was stunned, but she was otherwise occupied. She gave him her number and told him to call back.

He did. He lived in Houston, she was dating someone else. The next time he came to town she was single. They met. The rest, they say, is history. They were married in June and are now newlyweds in Texas.

"What a great story," Melanie and I collectively thought. We were very happy for her, and him.

Later that evening, Melanie and I were chatting with Matt near the kitchen.

Matt asked about Melanie's ankle tattoo. He seemed interested. I mentioned Tattoosday. "Want to see something?" he asked. He motioned us into the kitchen, away from the rest of the party guests.

"You've heard how Vibeke and I met, right?" he asked, touching a button on his shirt. We nodded. And he began to tell his story, similar to his wife's version, only he paused after speaking of her leaving the island way back in 1995.

The month after she departed, still devastated from the abrupt end to their relationship, he returned to his home in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

And there, he told us, unbuttoning his shirt and revealing his left shoulder, he went to Route 66 Fine Line Tattoo and got this:


See, dear readers, there was a relevant point to this story.

And Matt pointed out in this subtle aquatic tattoo, the marks of his true love. Here in the undulating leaves is a V for Vibeke, a C for her middle name, and an H (at the top of the piece) for her maiden name.

Woven into his tattoo of lost love and despair were the initials of the woman he loved. And he had no idea where she was.

But the years passed for Matt, as they did for Vibeke, and this ink in his flesh was an anchor reminding him of his love. And when people asked him about it, he explained it was just an aquatic-themed piece, an homage to his love of the ocean.

And fourteen years later they reunited and picked up where they had left off in 1995. Now married to the woman whose initials were subtly inked into his flesh, the tattoo has changed.

When fresh, the piece was a memento of loss, the missed moment of the road not taken, a reminder of a relationship that ended too soon.

Over the years, the tattoo meant hope that some day, the two would cross paths again. It was a daily reminder of what was lost, and what Matt hoped to regain.

Seemingly miraculously the two souls were reunited, and the tattoo, in its simple black and gray tones, represents perseverance and success. The ink may have faded in the sun, but the love only became more clear.

Matt and Vibeke's story is quite remarkable, and the time they were apart has faded. Togetherness always defeats the pain of separation.

I want to thank Matt and Vibeke for sharing their tale with us here on Tattoosday. It's not every day that we get to hear a full-blown love story on this site, and the fact that Matt's tattoo is at the center of it makes it even more wonderful.

Tattoos I Know: Paul, Part 4, or, The Great Cover-Up of 2008, continued...

Late last December, we posted about our friend Paul getting some cover-up work done on his upper right arm. Revisit the report here.

We recently checked in with Paul to see how things were going, and he updated us with the latest efforts by Horisei, who is about a session away from finishing this beautiful work:




Horisei tattoos out of the Chelsea Tattoo Company, formerly the home of Rising Dragon.

Thanks again to Paul for sharing. I'm guessing we'll see the finished product some time in 2010!

Re-Post: Tattoos I Know - The Grim Reaper

Today is a sad anniversary for us here on Tattoosday, for it marks one year since our friend, Tom Wacker, passed away unexpectedly.

Tom was an early supporter of the blog, from its fledgling days as a once-a-week feature over on BillyBlog, and he watched us grow with a mixture of excitement and pride.

The camera I use was a birthday gift from Tom and his fiancee Sephora, and he was always first in line to see the pictures I took whenever I had new material for the blog.

A week or two before his death, Tom was hanging out at a friend's house in New Jersey. He took pictures of his friend's sleeve and e-mailed them to me. The photos are still in my mailbox, unposted. I still haven't the heart to call his friend and talk tattoo with him.

There are times I am hesitant to approach people, for whatever reason, and I overcome whatever resistance I may feel, knowing that's what Tom would have wanted me to do, and that somewhere, he is watching, urging me on, applauding my efforts, admiring the ink.

As a tribute to Tom, I am reposting his tattoo, which he shared with us here, back in 2007.

It's not the best tattoo, but it's Tom's, and his spirit is infused here in Tattoosday. It's the least I can do for the friend that supported us so much in the early days. Here's to you, Tom!


Tattoos I Know: The Grim Reaper (originally posted September 11, 2007)


This is the sole tattoo of my friend and co-worker, Tom Wacker.

Tom designed and drew the art upon which this tattoo was based.

The Reaper is posed on Tom's biceps/deltoid and has resided there since 1984, when its host was a young lad of eighteen.

This is Tom's only tattoo and he has no plans to get more. He is proud of the fact that, because he designed it and because he then tore up the original design, it is a one-of-a-kind piece...

The tattoo was inked by Dean at Lola's Tattoos, then in Cliffside Park, but now in Bogota, New Jersey. Tom got this tattoo "because it was cool," although the tattooer tried to convince him not to get it because it was "too mean" for him. Twenty-three years later, Tom says he has no regrets about his ink.

Thanks, Tom!

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Friday the 13th: A Tattoosday Adventure

Today has finally arrived. A much-anticipated Friday the 13th. My wife, Melanie's, birthday. She was born on a Friday the 13th, so whenever it falls in March (the last one was in 1998, the next one is in 2015), it's always an event.

This Friday the 13th, I've taken the day off and plan on spending a large chunk of it with Melanie, waiting in line for what has become a New York City tradition: a lucky 13 tattoo courtesy of the good folks at Dare Devil Tattoo. Located on Ludlow Street on the Lower East Side, Dare Devil delivers $13 tattoos every Friday the 13th. They draw up some flash beforehand, and the clients get to choose from a selection of 13-themed, or Dare Devil-specific tattoos. As you'd imagine, they see a ton of customers, so we plan on arriving early to secure a spot.

10:30 AM - We hit the Manhattan Bridge, much later than we had hoped. We'd planned on a 10AM arrival. We're now anticipating a lengthy line.

10:45 AM - We've arrived. Maybe two dozen people ahead of us. The two young women who line up behind us point to a wall twenty feet away and said last month (a rare back-to-back Friday the 13th phenomenon), they lined up there and waited four hours. Best estimate at this point is to be done by 3 PM.

11:05 AM - A guy with a dog announces to the crowd, "We have a minor issue!" The group of two dozen people tenses up. They need us to line up North-South on Ludlow, as opposed to South-North. Apparently the neighboring store owner doesn't like her entrance blocked. Not a big deal. We all move, collectively exhaling. We do note that it is considerably colder out from under the scaffolding to the north. We are 21st and 22nd in line. There are 5 people behind us.

12:30 PM - They finally let in the first 10 people. The temperature has been struggling to get above freezing, and this has affected a little bit of the crowd's morale. However, we are given a reprieve. NYPD has received complaints about the 50+ people on the sidewalk, so a very nice Dare Devil employee named Rebecca takes our cell# and will call us, in about an hour to an hour and a half, by their estimate.

1:15 PM - We are sitting in a warm cafe on Avenue B. Caffeinating and restrooming. Heading back shortly.

2:00 PM - We are waiting across the street from the shop. Still no call....


2:15 PM - Peering in the window, we get our first look at the flash chosen for today's event.

And then, we enter the shop and things move quickly. Melanie fills out the requisite paperwork, we fork over a $20 bill ($13 for the tattoo, $7 for tip) and Rebecca asks Melanie which design she wants:


Understandably, she chooses a small "13". She would have gone for the Yankees logo, but there was no "13" in it. And wasn't that the point? Not to mention #13 is the jersey number of a much-maligned Yankee named Alex Rodriguez. She would have picked the cherry blossom flash, but the absence of the lucky digits was a deal-killer.

She didn't want any of the devils, and the various phallus and other crude designs are inappropriate.

We chatted with the young ladies from earlier in the day and discovered we had a mutual acquaintance, who they knew from school (Pratt).

And then Melanie was up. There was a brief debate about where the tattoo would go, in the middle of the back, or on the wrist. It is small enough that it can pass unnoticed on the wrist, or be covered by a bracelet or watch, should it be appropriate to do so. The wrist it is.























Jason June, the artist, jokes with us, as he tattoos the digits in under a minute. This certainly evens out the average tattoo time for the day, and makes it a quick pay-off for a long wait. The final product is a cute little "13" on the inside of her left wrist:


We walk back up to the front of the store, Rebecca asking Melanie how it went. Smiles all around. We put on our coats. Melanie asks me what time it is. I look at my BlackBerry and say "3:13".

I kid you not.

The stars have aligned and the sun is shining brightly outside. A perfect coda to a New York City tattoo adventure.

Tattoos I Know: Paul, Part 3, or, The Great Cover-Up of 2008

Earlier this year, I featured the first tattoo belonging to Paul, a co-worker and friend. Later on, he showed me his sleeve (here).

I am just getting around to show you his new work in progress, a cover-up of a tattoo on his right bicep, located above the first one of his that I featured here.

This isn't completed, but it does display a stage of the work that is interesting. Documenting it now will make it more interesting when the piece is completed.


That's an om symbol at the top of the piece. The basic design is a traditional Japanese half-sleeve. The work is done by Horisei at Chelsea Tattoo Company. Horisei inked my friend Rob's traditional Japanese tattoos (here).


Thanks again to Paul for sharing his work in progress here at Tattoosday. We're looking forward to seeing the final work in 2009!

Tom Wacker, 1966-2008

Late Thursday night I received a phone call I wish had never needed to be made.

My friend Sheri called me to tell me that her fiancé Tom had died unexpectedly earlier that day, the victim of an aneurysm. He was only 42.

People die every day in America, in the world. Young, old, healthy, sick. Death is a fact of life. Here at Tattoosday, we acknowledge that. Memorial tattoos abound.

But Tom was not just anyone. He was my friend, and he was with me from the beginning of this venture, one of Tattoosday's earliest fans and supporters. Not only did he offer up his own ink (reposted below), but he was always on the lookout for me, and saw most of the photos before they made it to the blogosphere. We'd exchange messages and updates over the weekends, and he always anticipated my return from lunch on weekdays, to see if I had spotted any awesome ink.

He knew how much I was yearning for a better camera, and he ended up getting me a new one, with Sheri, for my birthday.

And if we weren't talking ink, we were talking music, both of us big fans of Iron Maiden, Guns N' Roses, AC/DC, and Metallica.

Below is the post I ran of his tattoo, a grim reaper from his metalhead days. It's not spectacular work, but it graced his skin, and made him one of the inked nation.

Tattoos I Know: The Grim Reaper (originally posted September 11, 2007)


This is the sole tattoo of my friend and co-worker, Tom Wacker.

Tom designed and drew the art upon which this tattoo was based.

The Reaper is posed on Tom's biceps/deltoid and has resided there since 1984, when its host was a young lad of eighteen.

This is Tom's only tattoo and he has no plans to get more. He is proud of the fact that, because he designed it and because he then tore up the original design, it is a one-of-a-kind piece. He said that it was very painful because of the amount of black ink that went into it.

The tattoo was inked by Dean at Lola's Tattoos, then in Cliffside Park, but now in Bogota, New Jersey. Tom got this tattoo "because it was cool," although the tattooer tried to convince him not to get it because it was "too mean" for him. Twenty-three years later, Tom says he has no regrets about his ink.

Thanks, Tom!

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I have been posting less, of late, but Tom's spirit will live on through Tattoosday. For he is the audience I envision while writing. I know he would tell me not to mourn, but to keep on doing what I love, blogging ink, meeting new people, and showcasing their body art for all to enjoy.

I'll miss you, Tom. This blog's for you, too, wherever you are.