Tattoos, Trends, and Taking Risks (Never posted, but written on 11/16/11)

I really have nothing against tattoos. I have something against stupid tattoos. There is a guy with a tattoo of a monkey on his stomach and his bellybutton is the monkey's butt-hole. There is a guy that goes to my school that has a tattoo of lipsticked lips on his neck. I can't help but wonder if anyone has kissed him right on those lips just cause it is funny. I sure wouldn't, and I really feel gross thinking about it. Anyway, the other day Elizabeth and I were looking at an album of people's Twilight tattoos. They were awful. A distorted picture of Robert Pattinson's face permanently on my calf? No thank you. We were talking about how much people are going to regret their vampire ink and Elizabeth said, "You should never get a tattoo of a trend." That is so true.

As the excessively introspective person that I am, I started to think about how I apply the same rule to clothes sometimes. I do not want to wear something too trendy or I will look back on pictures and regret my outfit choice. My mom hates her wedding pictures because she had big hair and even bigger sleeves. She hates it now, but it was fashionable then! (I think...) Either way, whatever we are wearing now is going to look outdated someday. There is no avoiding the inevitable outfit regret. In fact, I think it is probably more satisfying to take some risks and look awesome now even if you might regret it later. Yeah, maybe we will look back on our obsession with braids and think, "What the heck was I thinking?" But you can't avoid regrets, so just look awesome now.

As the excessively introspective person that I am, I started to think about how I apply the same rule to making decisions in life. I don't want to look back in 10 years and have regrets. Of course, there is some value to that mindset. For example, I know that ditching studying might affect my grades which might affect my ability to get into graduate school. I will look back and wonder, "Why did going to see a movie seem more important than studying?" However, there is no guarantee that 10 years from now will come. Worrying about it now will just make now lame, and then in 10 years I will be worrying about 10 years from then.

So, get stupid tattoos. Wear crazy outfits. Don't worry about tomorrow. Actually don't get stupid tattoos.