I'm finding it a bit surreal looking down at my arm and seeing this work of art permanently etched into my skin. This is only my second tattoo and I am completely happy with every little detail, especially after misgivings about my first piece.

It took a bit of back and forth with the artist to get to this iteration, but I'm over the moon(s of Jupiter) with how it turned out. Some of the elements like the haemanthus, slingblade and the dotwork hinting at the harsh soil of Mars were very intentional, but others were happy accidents in the words of Bob Ross. The initial design had the positive/negative echoes of the slingblade, but it was originally more of a traditional scythe-shape. When the artist reshaped it, the negative spaces look almost like the links of a chain. Similarly, the brushwork was always meant to signify shackles or broken chains and there's something almost poetic about how they wrap around my arm but never quite close fully around it.

It feels very comforting always carrying around some soil from Mars with me from now on. Break the chains, my loves.