Remind Your Lungs

K.M. writes:

“I first found out about you in my psychology of women class in the spring of 2011. My professor played a video of you speaking at the TED conference and I fell head over heals for your poem “B”. It really spoke to me; as I watched I tried to write down and capture all my favorite parts. When it finished I had that warm fuzzy feeling you get when you find art that you just cannot live without! I spent a year sharing it with all my friends, scribbling my favorite line all over notebooks and white boards; “getting the wind knocked out of you is the only way to remind your lungs how much they like the taste of air”. I find it so inspirational that I got that line tattooed on me this weekend so I always have it.”

I can’t decide what my favorite part of this is: the spelling mistake that resulted in “head over heals” or the fact that I somehow wound up on a Psychology of Women class syllabus. This is also a pretty hefty tattoo to get. I’ve heard side tattoos are some of the most painful and this one is big. Here’s a closer look: