Badass Grandmas and Sailors

Most of you that know me well know that when it comes to topics of conversation I always seem to circle back to two things - boys and tattoos. I may think a lot about both, but sometimes in the midst of these kinds of things I stumble upon interesting articles. Thanks to some recent surfing on Modblog, one of my daily sites I like to check, I've been reading a few articles that I found linked there.

The first one I discovered kind of evokes laughs at first, but when you actually look at it, it's, well, kind of cool. Jean Russel, at 78 and residing in assisted living doing normal grandmother things like loving her grandchildren and making blankets, just got her first tattoo. Like the rest of the people who have their head on straight, she wanted it to have meaning. With the initials DLD representing her children, and 7 underneath for her grandchildren, she proudly displays the dark ink on her arm.



I don't know about you, but a lot of old people and grandmother types in my area generally frown upon this kind of thing. But, Jean found out that she was supported by her children and several other members of the community, inspiring them to help with her community service and blankets. The overall short period of time it took (twenty-five minutes) gives no justice to all the proud moments involved - the tattoo artist was happy to work with her, and successful despite the condition of Jean's skin (we all know old people skin is frail, and I imagine that's not easy to work with).

On the subject of tattoos, I now turn to nautical sailor markings, a style I find interesting despite it's now woven meaning into popular and even stereotypical tattoo culture. Philly, a place I love from experience, is having an exhibit called "Skin and Bones" on the history of sailors and their tattoos, explaining all the original oldschool meanings behind the imagery we all label today as "stereotypical" (such as all those swallow tattoos). Were this museum closer to home, I'd definitely be taking a trip - but for now, I have to admire all the information I can read up online. Though tattoos could mean as little as a pastime to them, it went from that to being a helpful tool of identification, as well as symbols that carried meanings all sailors could recognize. And one of my favorites - it was a bonding activity. What's better than a bunch of boys getting together to bond over someone getting tattooed out at sea?



Yup, that's right, they did this on the ships. Some carried the art to shore, but let's just say they started out with gunpowder and urine. Not appealing, but I guess the ocean can get pretty boring when you're sailing miles and miles to acquire some nice swallow tattoos to show off your mileage.

Though I could go on and on about how much I want to see this exhibit, I doubt it's going to happen. However, I will always continue to admire my venue of boys and tattoos online, so it's all good.