The Ants Go Marching …

I love tattoos, at least, the creative, artful ones: I’m not a fan of the skull-with-the-eyeballs-popping-out motif. If I were twenty-something again, I’d probably get a sleeve – or two – of a jungle scene, full of tigers and pythons and macaws. But given how far from 20 I am, I’m content with the shoulder and upper arm ink I have. Or am I? After each tattoo, I’ve sworn I’ve had the last. But a year or two ticks by, and I see another intriguing design - and there I go again. Ever since the last one – a line of ants marching around my ankle – I’ve been pondering a tattoo of just words, a significant phrase, a meaningful sentence. But what? At a recent writers retreat, I met Jess Cooper, who has a striking tat in Middle Earth script: Not all who wander are lost. It was exactly the kind of tattoo I had in mind. Short and pithy, and from a literary classic. But Jess already has it. My mission then is to find some other phrase that resonates with me. Thus I reactivate my blog after several years on hiatus, and I explore tattoos and words until I’ve settled on just the right maxim. If you’ve got words in a tattoo, what are they?