Back Issues

All of this hullaballo over Miley Cyrus' back photo is complete bullshit. It's a beautiful photo and her dad should be sticking up for her against all the celebrities mugging for the camera for a chance to say that someone else did something wrong.

I had a photo of my back tattoo taken and splashed across the front page of the Sunday Variety section of the Star Tribune once. My back didn't look like Miley's and it certainly wasn't photographed by Annie Leibovitz. Instead, it was shot by a photographer who started in Vietnam as a photo journalist. He had some really nice ideas that included me holding a picture frame against my back. I was extremely excited about this opportunity and I couldn't wait for it to come out. I had saved up money to send a copy to everyone I had ever met in my entire life.

That Sunday morning, I had grabbed the paper from my door like usual and sleepily paged through it when I suddenly saw my head and I screamed. It was a shock; even though I knew it was coming, I was still shocked. Of course I didn't like how my body looked but I was pleased with how the tattoo looked. The lighting was very well done to highlight the shading of the black and grey work. I had been interviewed along with about three or four other tattooed people but I got the biggest picture. I couldn't wait to talk to the rest of my family about it because there was so much more I wanted to say that couldn't fit in the interview.

I answered the phone later that morning and to my great surprise, a fist came flying through it. My dad was completely disgusted with it and the rest of my family felt that I had embarrassed myself and so had embarrassed them through association. I should have felt ashamed of myself.

I wasn't, instead I was very hurt. It didn't matter that I was 34, I was still letting myself be controlled by their opinion of me and eventually did become embarrassed. I didn't buy any copies for anyone. I cut the article and picture out but I hid it in a cabinet. I then became angry and decided that if my dad was ashamed of my image that he didn't need to hear from me anymore. The rest of my family felt that this again was the wrong move and couldn't figure out why I had decided to take this course of action and when was I going to stop being such a brat?

My brother was the only one who understood. He had been a called by an aunt who couldn't wait to exaggerate about all the chaos I was causing. I started explaining but I got to the point about how angry I was with dad, I couldn't get any words out. All he said was "I know". I was immediately relieved. I knew at least one person understood and it didn't matter if anyone else did. That phone call was in June of 2005 and it was the last one I would have with him.

That picture of Miley Cyrus is really good and she should be proud of It. I'm taking the article and picture out of the cabinet and putting it on the wall where it belongs.