No, not a tattoo, people.

Check it: Yours truly is featured on Minneapolis Photo Blog.

Three girlfriends and I had henna done at the Somali Mall (Carmelle's?) in Uptown. Somali people are warm and kind and smile a lot. I taught many of them this week at the learning center near Hiawatha and I love them.

So, the henna. It's applied like frosting and the artist works very quickly. It's a bit like mud--kind of cakey and cracks when it dries. Then, after you sit around with the other’s and have an hour or so of women talk (the same worldwide), they scrape it off with a knife. The black burns a little like a sunburn and kinda itches, so the knife-scraping feels good. This photo doesn't do it justice, really. It is very ornate and gorgeous. My artist was quite talented.

Then everyone tells you you're beautiful. Walk around the shops, people come out and hold your hands and look you in the eye and smile and say you're beautiful a thousand times. Your date might tell you he wants to eat your hands. In the Somali mall all covered in scarves and drapey things, it looks more flowery and elegant. In the real world of Minneapolis, it is still beautiful, but often mistaken for a tattoo of, say, a spiderweb, until you look up close.

My friends commented, so did a waitress, the parking garage attendant, a stranger in an elevator, someone at the doctor's office and the checkout boy at Kowalski's who said, "Not to be weird, but that's kinda sexy." The young gentleman who overcharged me for an air filter at Jiffy Lube took my hands, held them close up to his face and said "Wow. Wicked awesome." Then he gave me ten bucks off. It’s art. Powerful stuff.