The Tat Man

I originally posted this last year on Dave's birthday, and I modified it a little bit, but not much! My feelings are still same....and nothing has changed....Happy 38th Birthday Babe!! I love you!

I'm never going to marry any guy that has a shaved head, tattoos or an earring! A bold statement from my 11 year old cousin a few years ago. Why is that? Someone else asked. Well, duh. I want to marry someone who is going to be a good husband and a great father! I love my cousin to death....she is just about the sweetest thing there is, so I was pretty surprised to hear such shortsightedness coming out of her, but she was only 11 and I was willing to cut her some slack. My aunt (her mom) however, called her out on it. What about Dave? He shaves his head, has 3 tattoos and has an earring. Are you saying he isn't a good husband or a good dad?
She immediately got all red faced and realized she had made a broad generalization about a "type" of person that wasn't necessarily true. I wish I could say that this only happens with "the youngins" but I can't.

When Dave and I first met, he had a head of hair, not full head mind you, but it was there, and it covered his whole noggin. Just a few years later, it was best that he shave it. He blames me, I blame Kaira. :) Then he decided to re-pierce his ear. He really wanted to do his eye brow, but knew that work really wouldn't go for that. We got married and one of our groomsmen gave us/him a gift certificate to Iron Age as a wedding present. And thus began the obsession. He would have more than three if I would allow it, but they are expensive!!!

Tattoo #1 by Joseph Reincke

#2 by Trevor Collis

#3 also by Trevor Collis

This third one is the one that sent me over the edge. I now have to carefully buy his short sleeved shirts to ensure that the sleeves will cover this bad boy, because he is upper management and tats are a big no no. He has also had to let his earring hole close up. Anyway....he loves to show them off and I thought that since today (Thursday) is

HIS 38th BIRTHDAY!

I would indulge him. It's also to show that you really can't judge someone's character or who they really are by their outward appearance. He is a great husband, that lets me sleep in on the weekends, helps out around the house, and knows when to let me be right, which is most of the time. He is a fabulous dad, who is not content to be on the sidelines observing his children, but prefers to be right in the mix. He gives them their baths, reads bedtime stories, plays games, and puts them in timeout. He is a friend for life. He still plays softball with buddies from college, some he has known for almost 20 years. He is well respected and liked at work. He is the boss that everyone wants to work for. So despite the fact that he has Male Pattern Blindness, and will trip over a Target bag and a stack of clothes and shoes sitting on the stairs that need to go up, and will continue to go upstairs while he is still empty handed, or will head down the stairs empty handed, while the laundry basket is sitting at the top of the stairs waiting to go down, I love him. Despite the fact that he can't find his hat in the closet or the tortillas in the pantry even though I have told him exactly where they are, and OMG, if I get up and find them right where I said that they were, he will be in so much trouble, and yep, there they are, I love him. Despite the fact that his snoring is slowly killing me, and even though for some reason he didn't snore one bit during his sleep study to get the CPAP machine, and he was happy about it, I still love him. I could go on and on, but you know what? So could he, I'm sure. So happy birthday honey. I love you. I promise I won't judge you when you are really really old, and all of your tattoos are sagging and mis-shapen and you can't read the kids' names on them anymore, because you know, that's like only 2 years away.