steenyall

After going through a break up, I ended up spending a few weeks on my friend's sofa while I figured a new living situation. During that time, I was already signed up for my office's "lunch club" where our staff all pays one person to make a lunch that was special to them. Rather than admit that I couldn't handle this during my crisis, I attempted to make a lunch that included freshly fried french fries.
Cut to the day of the lunch, I'm rushing around because I'm woefully under prepared and just trying to get something together. I remember I need to start cooking these fries and absentmindedly I toss a bunch of damp potatoes in oil that's too hot. It instantly boils over and now I have a small grease fire on the stove in my open office. I shout for help and without thinking, attempt to pat the flame out with my hands (do not recommend). Three or four colleagues run up behind me and are able to quell the flames while I slink away to the bathroom to tend to my hands.
After a few minutes of trying to get myself together, I walk out of the bathroom to see 20 pairs of eyes on me and instantly breakdown. As I'm sobbing, my boss (and soon to be closest friend) says, "no, no, no. No need to cry. This is just.. this is just a physical manifestation of where your life is at right now." I decided to keep that moment of support from a dear friend with me and got an outline of a frying pan on fire on my inner arm.

After going through a break up, I ended up spending a few weeks on my friend's sofa while I figured a new living situation. During that time, I was already signed up for my office's "lunch club" where our staff all pays one person to make a lunch that was special to them. Rather than admit that I couldn't handle this during my crisis, I attempted to make a lunch that included freshly fried french fries.
Cut to the day of the lunch, I'm rushing around because I'm woefully under prepared and just trying to get something together. I remember I need to start cooking these fries and absentmindedly I toss a bunch of damp potatoes in oil that's too hot. It instantly boils over and now I have a small grease fire on the stove in my open office. I shout for help and without thinking, attempt to pat the flame out with my hands (do not recommend). Three or four colleagues run up behind me and are able to quell the flames while I slink away to the bathroom to tend to my hands.
After a few minutes of trying to get myself together, I walk out of the bathroom to see 20 pairs of eyes on me and instantly breakdown. As I'm sobbing, my boss (and soon to be closest friend) says, "no, no, no. No need to cry. This is just.. this is just a physical manifestation of where your life is at right now." I decided to keep that moment of support from a dear friend with me and got an outline of a frying pan on fire on my inner arm.

After going through a break up, I ended up spending a few weeks on my friend's sofa while I figured a new living situation. During that time, I was already signed up for my office's "lunch club" where our staff all pays one person to make a lunch that was special to them. Rather than admit that I couldn't handle this during my crisis, I attempted to make a lunch that included freshly fried french fries.
Cut to the day of the lunch, I'm rushing around because I'm woefully under prepared and just trying to get something together. I remember I need to start cooking these fries and absentmindedly I toss a bunch of damp potatoes in oil that's too hot. It instantly boils over and now I have a small grease fire on the stove in my open office. I shout for help and without thinking, attempt to pat the flame out with my hands (do not recommend). Three or four colleagues run up behind me and are able to quell the flames while I slink away to the bathroom to tend to my hands.
After a few minutes of trying to get myself together, I walk out of the bathroom to see 20 pairs of eyes on me and instantly breakdown. As I'm sobbing, my boss (and soon to be closest friend) says, "no, no, no. No need to cry. This is just.. this is just a physical manifestation of where your life is at right now." I decided to keep that moment of support from a dear friend with me and got an outline of a frying pan on fire on my inner arm.

All folk on my maternal grandmother's side were gypsies who traveled pre-WW1 Europe chasing the fruit/vegetable harvests and telling tarot cards to make a living. Always on the road they carried their stories/possessions on their skin instead of in their homes (they had none).
Fast-forward to the '80s and me growing up among these faded blue-grey tattoos of my landlocked relatives. At funerals/weddings/weekends, some showed their tattoos and told the toddler me: when I died St Peter would ask to prove ID at The Gates; while the plainskins patted down their now-nude bodies for proof of who they were, my kinfolk told me, they - the gypsies - only needed to point to their tattoos and stroll smiling right in through Heaven's doors.
For a decade the thought of dying plain and ID-less terrified me so much that finally as a (young) teenager I blagged an older cousin's driver's license, faked my way into the town's only tattoo parlour and got my first tattoo.

It's a waste of good real estate.