During my years writing “Cellars by Starlight,” I watched with dismay as kids in bands would return from their trips out of the area with fresh tattoos. No one ever picked anything original, and I felt like a hypocrite when I said something pleasantly noncommittal when shown their flame or superhero or cute widdle butterfly. At least with Maori moko, the designs are deliberately abstract, and therefore open to interpretation. Each design is completely customized for the recipient and reflects a historical and genealogical influence. Those tattoos mean a lot to those people. They don’t mean, “I got drunk in New Orleans.”

Get a tattoo in Massachusetts and you can’t give blood for 12 months. (We’re unregulated — ditto New Hampshire and New York. Connecticut, Maine, Rhode Island, and Vermont tattoo parlors, however, are regulated by the state.)

My grandfather Krikor Mirijanian survived the Armenian genocide but saw his family slaughtered. He tattooed a cross using a sewing needle and campfire ash on the inside of his left forearm, an act practiced by other diaspora Armenians. The purpose of this was covert and revolutionary. By showing your arm to other Armenians, you could identify yourself as a Christian, and therefore at risk. But you would keep your arm bent and close to your body otherwise. My grandfather’s tattoo is enough for me. I wear his tattoo in my heart.