So off we went, the three of us, to the Tattoo Parlor. Once we got there, I told the clerk what I wanted, and he suggested I wait about five more minutes for Valerie to come into work because she is an expert at Tatting Hearts. I didn't have to wait. At that moment, a hauntingly beautiful, pierced, tattooed, black raven haired, black lipstick lipped, black denim wearing woman walks in with the brightest green eyes you will ever see, besides in an oriental jade statue. She had the deep sultry voice, reminiscent of the Nigerian-born singer, Sade. I sat down on her workstation chair, introduced myself, she shook my hand, and said Hi. After awhile, the outline of the heart was done with the word Mom in it, and Valerie starting to color in the blue roses surrounding the Tat. That is when a gentleman walks in brandishing a gun. When he sees Valerie, he immediately goes in her direction, waving the pistol, telling everyone to get out of the place. Luckily, my two daughters and everyone else, got out of the place safely. Except me. I, my friends, was frozen in my chair. One reason, because of a crazed wielding lunatic with a gun, the second, because my Tattoo Artist had a tight grip on my arm, still working on my Tattoo! The man walks up to us, stands not even five feet in front of Valerie, and says, "If I can't have you, nobody will." Without flinching, the woman holding onto my arm, looks up and says, "Shut up Fred. You know you're going to jail for this." Then Fred, the lunatic, shakily points the pistol towards her head, and screams as if he is trying with all his might to pull the trigger, but that something is stopping him. In the meantime, Valerie lets go of my arm, stares at Fred with bored jaded eyes, as if she was boring a whole through his mind. That is when I thought I had my chance to escape. I was slowly moving off the chair, when I got my feet tangled in its legs. I tumbled forward, chair and all, into a screaming Fred. The gun goes off, I knock Fred to the floor, where Valerie gives him a quick black boot kick to the side of his head, knocking him out cold. The bullet? It grazed right across my tribute to my Mother, erasing her name, leaving a permanent scare where the word Mom used to be. The local Newspaper lauded me as a Hero, while the local Police branded me as a foolish Vigilante who could have gotten himself killed. Today, after I went back to the Parlor to see what Valerie could do to fix my Tat, she told me, that if I leave the way it was, looking like a Broken Heart ripped in two, she would never reveal my clumsy encounter with a chair, which was the cause of me falling into the gun toting Fred. My choices at that moment were; save face in front of the World and stay a Hero, or have a woman with green eyes embarrass me by telling the World the truth.
This is,
Which Choice Would You Choose?
Jim Hauenstein,
And,
“If you are not the hero of your own story, then you're missing the whole point of your humanity.”
- Steve Maraboli, -
- Steve Maraboli, -
That is my story and I am sticking to it!
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