Hug O’ War

Last weekend, I was hanging out at my twin brother’s house. It was early in the morning and wanted to kill some time so I decided to browse his vast book collection. I came across one of our most cherished books from childhood, Where The Sidewalk Ends by the legendary artist and writer Shel Silverstein. As I was flipping through the book, I arrived at one of my favorite poems, Hug O’ War:

I immediately Google’d Hug O’ War to learn more about what inspired Shel to write the poem. I discovered that he wrote it to widely express nonviolence and goodness to the world. That expression really resonated with me. As I reflected on the poem, the words non-violence, cooperation, winning, surrender, love, happiness and goodness kept coming up for me. I felt those words accurately represent what I value as a human being.

Yesterday, I walked into a tattoo parlor near Chinatown in San Francisco and had Shel’s Hug O’ War illustration etched on the back my arm. My hope is that it’ll serve as a reminder to always love, support, serve and cooperate rather than to fight, harm or hurt.

Here’s to filling the world with more kindness. I can’t think of a better purpose than that.