20 to 50: 1990
The big 3-0! I was angsting about that---between Logan's Run and "Never trust anyone over 30", I was slightly freaked. Peter sent me a birthday card that said: "So you're turning 30? Cheer up!" and inside: "Some people have been known to live for WEEKS after that."
I took a Greyhound bus up to see him for Thanksgiving, although I didn't confide my ulterior motive to him until I got there.
I was going to get a tattoo.
Tangental to my rock and roll leanings, I'd started buying tattoo magazines, of which there were a couple, and I'd discovered an affinity for tribal, which was an embryonic trend in those days. There was an artist in New York, name of Jonathan Shaw, whose work I really liked, and I determined to visit my bro for proximity and go get inked.
When he found out where it was---1st St and 1st Ave in Manhattan---he refused to let me go alone, and when we drove through there in a cab, I could see why. Freaking scary.
That's when I got my lizard. I expected it to hurt a lot more than it did---GK had gotten a black dragon on her shoulder a year or so earlier, and according to her, it was searing!pain!. I didn't have that experience; in fact, walking back to where we could catch another cab (which is a sign of my brother's caution about the neighborhood as he usually took the subway everywhere)---I felt like I'd lost a fast 30 pounds. Endorphins, gotta love 'em.
Returning from ANYWHERE on Thanksgiving Sunday is a mistake. Especially on a Greyhound bus. At one point on the Jersey turnpike, it took us 47 minutes to go 2 miles. (I checked my watch from the time my window inched past the sign announcing the rest stop ahead to the point where we drew abrest of that exit.) There was a screaming baby on board, the woman in the seat next to me was hacking out a lung, and it was a long night.
Because of the crawling traffic, we had to rendezvous with another bus at a travel plaza, and they cautioned us to bring all of our belongings with us to the new bus. As I was boarding, the driver asked if I'd left anything on the first bus.
"Only my sanity," I replied.
It's probably still kicking around their lost and found.
.
I took a Greyhound bus up to see him for Thanksgiving, although I didn't confide my ulterior motive to him until I got there.
I was going to get a tattoo.
Tangental to my rock and roll leanings, I'd started buying tattoo magazines, of which there were a couple, and I'd discovered an affinity for tribal, which was an embryonic trend in those days. There was an artist in New York, name of Jonathan Shaw, whose work I really liked, and I determined to visit my bro for proximity and go get inked.
When he found out where it was---1st St and 1st Ave in Manhattan---he refused to let me go alone, and when we drove through there in a cab, I could see why. Freaking scary.
That's when I got my lizard. I expected it to hurt a lot more than it did---GK had gotten a black dragon on her shoulder a year or so earlier, and according to her, it was searing!pain!. I didn't have that experience; in fact, walking back to where we could catch another cab (which is a sign of my brother's caution about the neighborhood as he usually took the subway everywhere)---I felt like I'd lost a fast 30 pounds. Endorphins, gotta love 'em.
Returning from ANYWHERE on Thanksgiving Sunday is a mistake. Especially on a Greyhound bus. At one point on the Jersey turnpike, it took us 47 minutes to go 2 miles. (I checked my watch from the time my window inched past the sign announcing the rest stop ahead to the point where we drew abrest of that exit.) There was a screaming baby on board, the woman in the seat next to me was hacking out a lung, and it was a long night.
Because of the crawling traffic, we had to rendezvous with another bus at a travel plaza, and they cautioned us to bring all of our belongings with us to the new bus. As I was boarding, the driver asked if I'd left anything on the first bus.
"Only my sanity," I replied.
It's probably still kicking around their lost and found.
.