Tattoo outline = DONE

Wow, was it really a year ago that I last got tattooed?  Seems like it's been FOREVER.  Anyway, yesterday was my first session for the piece at the bottom of my back, which I have been turning over in my mind for years and so it's such a relief to go ahead and do it.  I couldn't be more pleased with my new artist, Sam, who was very enthusiastic about my pelican idea and shared stories about watching pelicans dive-bomb the waves while she was out surfing.  She was also great to talk to during the session, and really helped to draw my jumble of ideas into an awesome and cohesive piece, that works fantastically well with my existing back tattoo!  Yes!
So, here is the finished outline (still a little red looking, ha, my skin is a little more tender down there than in other places!):

The line is from "The Far Field," by Theodore Roethke:
(Section 3)

The river turns on itself,
The tree retreats into its own shadow.
I feel a weightless change, a moving forward
As of water quickening before a narrowing channel
When banks converge, and the wide river whitens;
Or when two rivers combine, the blue glacial torrent
And the yellowish-green from the mountainy upland,-
At first a swift rippling between rocks,
Then a long running over flat stones
Before descending to the alluvial plain,
To the clay banks, and the wild grapes hanging from the elmtrees.
The slightly trembling water
Dropping a fine yellow silt where the sun stays;
And the crabs bask near the edge,
The weedy edge, alive with small snakes and bloodsuckers,-
I have come to a still, but not a deep center,
A point outside the glittering current;
My eyes stare at the bottom of a river,
At the irregular stones, iridescent sandgrains,
My mind moves in more than one place,
In a country half-land, half-water.

I am renewed by death, thought of my death,
The dry scent of a dying garden in September,
The wind fanning the ash of a low fire.
What I love is near at hand,
Always, in earth and air.

Ahh, I LOVE that line.  Anyway, my next appointment is not until after I return from Florida, at the end of July.  Sam graciously agreed to do a little work on my existing back tattoo, adding some more blue to the water and possibly correcting the tail on one of the mourning doves (should be pointed, not square, arrggghhh why didn't I find that out until after the tattoo was done?).  I'm mostly excited to see how the color on the pelicans comes out, and of course will update here as soon as anything changes!