Maria's Tatoo

All I saw at first was a small beatific head smiling up
 from Maria's breasts.  She caught me staring at it and began to 
unbutton her shirt.

	"Would you like to see my tatoo?"she looked down at 
herself, proudly displaying an image of the Virgin Mary in plain 
black outline rising 4 or 5 inches in the middle of her 
olive-skin chest.  The demure Goddess, hands clasped, was a bold 
image, not to mention her placement between Maria's small, round 
breasts.  The message was simultaneously sexual and innocent.
  		Within me, what began as a feeling of shock 
became fascination and interest. Why the Virgin Mary? Maria was a
 talented artist who could have created any image for tatoo. I
 knew Maria was from a Catholic background but I had never 
understood the extent of her attachment to her Mother's devotion
 to the Virgin.

	Scenes of relentless abuse are smeared over 
Maria's childhood.  Fear, anxiety and hopelessness were 
daily emotions for a little girl who lived in fear of the
monster thatloomed in her household.  The middle daughter
of three sisters growing up in the Italian neighborhood of St.Leonard,Montreal, Maria was a quiet, sensitive girl .
 Little girls in this microsociety were often touched by men who made comments on the development of their little bodies.
Maria grew up feeling terrorized by her father and completely unprotected from men in the community.

		It was only when she married and left home that
 she was freed from the constant threat of abuse, but the trauma
 remains.  As an artist,  Maria uses painting and sculpture to 
explore vague memories that she has buried in order to cope with
 the demands of daily life. 
 
		Helplessness is common feeling which stems out of 
abuse.  Pina Modicamore could do nothing to stop her husbands
 rages and getting in the way had its own consequences.  Her
 guilt overwhelming, she would prostrate herself to an image of 
the virgin, often in tears, begging forgiveness for her husbands 
twisted expressions of his own inner torment.  As demons circled
 the household, Pina Modicamore found solace in images of Our 
Lady, an island in chaotic waters.  The smiling face offered 
forgiveness and reassurance while centuries of tradition closed 
in on her, urging her in heavy-handed tones to remain by her 
husband, to help and protect him. 
 
	          As a grown woman, Maria has gone through 
endless hours of therapy, attempting to understand and come to
 terms with rising images of her cruel childhood.  Unable to put 
her own fate in the hands of Catholic tradition, she has a strong
 need to understand and believe in her mother's faith in the 
Virgin's power.  In order to share her healing with Pina, Maria's
 tatoo symbolizes solidarity with her mother's quest for
 forgiveness and peace.