"Is the purple tattoo on your left arm a new one?" he asks, while I am not looking at him, absolutely absorbed in reading the menu and looking for something to eat that could be keto-friendly.
I look up, a little bit puzzled. Our eyes meet.
I have been knowing him for over two years, now. It's quite strange that he never noticed that one.
Still, since I am absolutely used to any kind of questions about my tattoos, I roll up the sleeve of my black blouse a little bit more, I show him the full purple tattoo he is referring to.
[So many tattoos ago, so many haircuts ago...
That's me, ladies & gents, in 2016.
Can you spot the big purple tattoo on my left arm?]
And here we are: I explain that nope, it is a very old one, only purple ink and no black lines, I've got it myself when I completed my magister degree in cinema history and yada yada yada.
Auto-pilot mode about tattoo questions, welcome at the dinner table, just take a seat and enjoy the evening with us, wouldn't you? What can I order you? Some bananas, maybe?
Question answered. Auto-pilot mode about tattoo questions off again. Now I can I go back to studying the menu, busy with my ketogenic quest...
You know already where this one is heading, aren't you?
As embarrassing as it can be to admit it with yourself, you spent too many years flirting in German when you need up to two to three hours for realizing, after the fact and after the dinner is over, that a guy that you know well commenting on your old tattoos is actually telling you between the lines:
"I am looking at your naked tattooed skin while you are not looking at me and I want you to know it and to point this out, so that your tattoos (= your body) can be our next topic of conversation, and I will keep talking about it long enough for you to get it".
We don't see things as they are. We see things as we are.
"I am looking at your naked tattooed skin while you are not looking at me and I want you to know it and to point this out, so that your tattoos (= your body) can be our next topic of conversation, and I will keep talking about it long enough for you to get it".
We don't see things as they are. We see things as we are.
Joe Dispenza
[Funny enough, expressions like "flirting with someone"
and "playing the flirt with someone" can be translated into Italian with
"fare la civetta" and "civettare", that literally mean...
"playing the owl". Maybe I need even more owls on the walls,
in order to open my eyes and be less blind about flirting... ^^]
Ketogenic-friendly dishes aside, next time it could be a good idea for me to check if I can find on the menu also something for my own intercultural dating blind spots, that get activated immediately as soon as the auto-pilot mode about tattoo questions is involved...
Tags: Singleness, Love, Relationships, Dating, Flirting, Intercultural communication, Cultural blindness, Questions about tattoos
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