ink on ink
let me first preface this by saying that i am of the firm belief that i have died several times to become the person that i am today. i chose my tattoos to help remind me each time i shed my skin of what i've left behind. they mean a lot to me, and are there for me for good reasons that cannot be explained in the five minute attention-span window most people have when they ask me in person what they mean. so i will put it here and hope that will leave questions at rest.
WINGS: as long as i can remember, i have always wanted wings. i have always wanted to be an angel, and i know how silly that sounds. but the thing is i really want to save people, or protect them. it's something that i work hard at everyday. i guess it's because the more people i help, the more i believe that i can help myself. i have fallen from that ideal before, and gave up on myself. i had never planned on living this long, which is a sad thing for a 23 year old to say. but at that time, i had no voice of my own; my life was dictated by another, and he called the shots on just about anything that i did through force. the only things i could control were the books i read, and food; i became obsessed with food. so i read, and i starved, and i plotted. college was a pipe dream; the harder he held me down, the more grim my future became until i could only see one way out. but one day, i pushed back. i don't know where the strength came from--it certainly wasn't a conscious effort at the time--but i liked it. so i pushed him away. i had my life back again; the only problem was it had been out of my hands for a little over two years and i wasn't sure what to do with it. i had given up until then. i applied and got into college. there were nights i would wake up in my dorm screaming, afraid to just exist in such an unknown world. but i was still doing it--it was all on me. i saved myself. the explanation i'll give you in passing for the wings is that my college mascot was an angel, but what should be read into it is the fact i went to college in the first place because i'm still alive. i may have fallen from grace, but my wings are not broken. i'm not afraid.
PUZZLE: the comment i give you in passing is that it is the symbol for autism. still, the fact that i decided to have that permanently etched into my skin should say something about how dedicated i am to this field. i started working with these kids on a whim, and now i need them to breathe. they have always been there for me when i needed them, and i will always try to do the same in return. my love for them is unconditional, and my life without them is empty. there is no "ellie" without "the kids." it's all one package.
COMPASS: "in my life, i must get lost before i can get found." cryptic and yet interesting enough to suffice. i may even crack a joke about how poor i am with directions, despite having taught an orienteering course at Girl Scout camp for three years. i do get lost though. being bipolar is a life-long struggle, and taking an easy out sometimes looks like a good idea. there are days when it becomes so unbearably aggravating. what's worse is that i have this horrible tendency to sabotage myself when things are going right. one of my favorite methods is to stop taking my medications. this usually coincides with a particularly pleasant manic phase, that turns into a particularly scary manic phase, followed by a sheer plummet into a depression. with such highs and lows as a guaranteed uncertainty in life, it can be difficult to maintain an even keel, or even lose sight of the destination. but through my friends and family who love me, i've always been able to pull back onto course. i'm grateful for that, everyday.
DOTS: okay, so these actually get the most comments of all of them. these are also the ones that i won't spare details on because it doesn't make sense unless i tell the whole story. my best friend and roomate in college was diagnosed with cancer the summer before our junior year. i was devastated, and felt like i had lost a limb for the entire semester she was out getting chemo. she came back for the spring semester, and did school full-time while getting radiation therapy done. for radiation therapy, they have to mark you in specific areas to make sure they line the machine up in the exact same places every time. she has 6 or so blue dots along her torso for this purpose, that will remain there for the rest of her life. i only got two: one on each shoulder in the same place as hers. now we have matching tattoos. now i can show her how much that time impacted my life.
and there you go.