This was my first tattoo, I got it 3 years ago, a few months after my mother passed away from breast cancer. I was 16 and her passing essentially broke me.
The flowers I chose were Anemones. Purple and pinks were her favourite colours and the pink also for breast cancer.
There’s this greek myth about the goddess Aphrodite and her mortal lover Adonis. Basically Ares, filled with jealousy kills the mortal. Heartbroken, Aphrodite carries her late lover’s body through the forest on her chariot, weeping.
When drops of his blood fell from the chariot to the earth, they mixed with the Goddess’ tears and upon hitting the earth, anemones grew.
Anemone means wind flower because the wind blows these flowers apart, spreading its seed throughout the land where they grow anew. The wind ends one life only to bring life to another through its actions. Death and rebirth. Beauty from pain. Happiness from sorrow.
I don’t mourn the death of my mother, my best friend. I celebrate how she persevered through 12 years of battle with the disease, rose from Barrister to Senior Council to a Judge of the Circuit Court in Ireland.
It was a terrible thing to happen to anyone, but I live to see the flowers grow from these tears and these wounds.
Done by Rob Mulligan of Colour Works Tattoo Studio, Dublin.