Tattoo

Venture out of the metropolitan bowl of Seoul and you find a Korea that is verdant and mountainous. As a result, the bullet train to Busan spends much of the time in tunnels. We rode it like a metaphore across the unfamiliar, and under obstacles of geography enroute to our destination.

There is no place I’d rather be than here in Korea with most of my adventurous family (we miss you Isaac and Abigail!). And being in Busan, the part of Korea where my mother and grandmother are from, it’s nice to have their support. Like time travel, successive trips to Korea –to what increasingly feels like home– brings me closer to that place in time where it all began for my mother and grandmother, mostly in hardship.

Experiences like war and its aftermath can imprint on DNA. Generations later an unassuming trigger can awaken that animal within. It may only be a vague awareness to pay attention. Or a lump in the throat. Unprompted tears. Memories that are not your own, but that belong to a collective past, gently asking to be released. Maybe this is what “full circle” feels like. We are here now, but I’m not sure if it is part of a shared circle, or just a different one. Maybe one we are forming with our kids? My processing speed is slow, and the significance of these types of events takes a while to blossom. Sometimes they never flower.

Getting a tattoo can be a bit like travel, especially to a place of personal significance. It can be less about seeing an experience than feeling it that leaves an indelible mark.