I was working for M (my boss at the greenhouse in real life) as a tattoo apprentice and in the dream, he was the one that tattooed the tulip poplar on my arm. He had just finished that and it was my turn to tattoo the same thing onto a little girl’s arm. Before that, M took me around the old roads where he used to commute with a Japanese man to repair old rail lines or road infrastructure. We had to step off the road down into these really steep areas with vegetation and hold tight onto twisted metal to not fall off. It was really scary. He told me about the Japanese man he used to travel with around these roads and he showed me how they traveled – they would fling their bodies around the metal like they were roller coaster cars. They wouldn’t use the roads themselves. It all sounded so fantastic and frightening and it played like a little movie in my head while he told me about it. A beautiful and terrifying dance. One final shot of the Japanese man diving off of the road into the deep brush. Then I had to go tattoo this little girl but I needed fresh milk to do so. L and I realized we had no fresh milk because we had left both cartons sitting out. Our apartment was very small and dingy and dirty and possibly in Japan. The teenage mutant ninja turtles made an appearance. Before I picked up the little girl I had a realization that I had no idea how to tattoo. I was going to call M and tell him I was bringing the girl to him so he could do it and really teach me.