Rhody Ink

Tattoos are everywhere. A 2006 study by the Pew Research Center showed that thirty-six percent of Gen Nexters, Americans in the 18–25 age bracket, and 40 percent of Gen Xers, those in the 26–40 age bracket, have at least one tattoo.

The URI community is no exception, and we found some creative ink among our students, alumni, staff, and faculty. Here’s a sampling.

 

Michelle Krawczynski ’11, Pharm.D. candidate
Northampton, Mass.

Michelle’s tattoo depicts the chemical structure of serotonin. She says, “I got this tattoo in January 2010 to represent my love for the sciences and as a unique way of saying, ‘Be happy.’ Serotonin is the chemical that makes people happy. It is the neurotransmitter that common antidepressant drugs such as Zoloft and Paxil target. I call it my anti-drug. I hope it will always keep me in a good mood.”

 

Patricia “Trish” Marchant Culver ’80, M.A. ’93,
Portsmouth, RI
Staff Development Coordinator, Grand Islander Nursing Home

“I love URI and am a very proud and enthusiastic URI fan and alumna. I have a huge collection of URI ‘stuff,’ and my husband calls the corner of our living room the ‘shrine’ to URI. About the tattoo: the top of the anchor is an 8, because I was born in ’58, graduated in ’80, and the Rams had great basketball teams in ’78 and ’98.”

 

Brian Maynard
Professor of Horticulture
URI Department of Plant Sciences

“The story is that I never wanted a tattoo, but my oldest son Tate (21) has been apprenticing to be a tattoo artist since he was 18, and got his license a year ago. He needed a first ‘customer’ and I volunteered. This was his first tattoo job and my first tattoo. He is a great artist, but made lots of small mistakes his first time on real skin with a tattoo gun. I remind him that I still proudly display his first grade art on my office wall. And so I proudly display his first tattoo effort. The tattoo is a anklet of vines with leaves and grape clusters, and my three sons’ names—Tate, Jens, and Rory—in their own signatures.”

 

Marquis Jones ’11, English major
South Plainfield, NJ
URI Rams Basketball, guard, #5

“This is my first tattoo, and the one that means the most to me. It shows praying hands with the cross and rosary beads hanging from it. It represents my love for Christ, and every day I try to live as close to Him as possible.”

 

Jess Raffaele ’04, M.S. ’09
Program Assistant, Alumni Relations

“The lightning bolts represent my astrological sign, Aquarius, and the star symbolizes the sky. These remind me that anything is possible.”

 

Jeffrey Moriarty, ’91, Finance,
Wakefield, RI
Vice President, Bank of America Leasing

“When my pledge class became brothers at my fraternity, Phi Sigma Kappa, in the spring of 1988, we all decided to go to Newport and get tattoos of our Greek house letters on our ankles. Stupid, stupid, stupid, and yes, I do greatly regret it! FYI, my fraternity is now the Women’s Center on Upper College Road.”