I had a vague recollection of a post that described it in detail so I tried to find it and couldn’t.
So I’m just going to type it all out tonight and leave it here for anyone that’s curious.
If I ever have enough money again to waste some, I really would like to get all 3 of my tattoos touched up and maybe embellished too.
So here we go:
The main body is primarily that of a dream catcher. I am not Native American, but I do have a unique affinity for Native American belief systems. I’m particularly aligned with the Lakota tribes beliefs as well as some particular beliefs of other tribes/cultures. The ring itself, even though you can’t tell from the picture is made up of two braided rings of wood. This part wasn’t part of the original dream catcher. I added that in to show how all things…, living and dead, present and past, loved or unwanted…, they all intertwine.
Inside the dream catcher you’ll find the Yin and the Yang. A symbol of not only my duality, but of the world’s as well. I made the Yin/Yang out of Fire and Ice respectively to symbolize both my passion, and also my ability to ice over my soul and heart whenever I feel the need to. A thing that was much easier when I was the young man who designed and then had someone put this on his back.
You’ll notice a staff like thing that runs across the lower portion of it. This is actually a double headed spear, though I don’t think the blades actually show in the pic. This small part is in recognition of a trail name I picked up from my hiking buddies back in my 20’s. After a particular 35 mile, 4 day/3 night, traverse of a mountain range in N.H. my friends started calling me Single-Two-Spears. I won’t bother to relate the actual tale that tells why they gave me the name, but the name stuck and the spear made its way into the tattoo a few years or more later. Those guys still call me that when they see me.
At the top of the circle you’ll see what appears to be flames, and that’s because they are flames. My life wasn’t ever easy, even though I have managed to enjoy some of it from time to time. The flames are a reminder to me that my world will often burn and I am often the one with the flint & tinder. (younger people may need to look that phrase up - definitely nothing to do with dating sites)
Inside the Yin/Yang are bear prints or tracks. Whichever you prefer to call them is fine with me. I love bears. I consider them my spirit animal. They are often in my dreams and I also have some very specific reasonings behind why I believe they are akin to me. I won’t go into all of that in any real detail though.
I took a printed copy of a dream catcher and then drew the rest of it. My artist was a man named Wes, who lives up in the White Mountains of N.H. and had a parlor called Wild West Tattoos
Anyway, though there is more I could say about the tat, I think this description of it does it some justice and offers a good enough explanation of it.
The nickname story is fairly quick and easy. The bears thing not so much.
I’m actually walking to a restaurant for dinner right now but I’ll try to message you about the nickname sometime tomorrow.
As for the bear thing, well that’s a whole todo and is more of a conversation than anything I’d care to type out, but I’ll try to relay bits of it to you at some point.
