John Rodrigues’ Beastly Menagerie

The story behind my sleeve goes back to an old story of a rooster in Portuguese culture.  The rooster saves an innocent man’s life and is now considered a symbol of good luck.  I decided I wanted to a take on that rooster, but wanted the artist to have full reign on design/interpretation.  He decided to do the bird in three different perspectives.  We then added some of my favorite culinary flowers, borage and viola, on my arm.  Finally, we decided to add a wolf in the inner arm, kind of the antithesis to the good luck the rooster symbolizes.

My chest symbolizes my first born son.  He was born prematurely on July 24th, two days away from my birthday.  Since he was born a Leo like me and so young we decided to name him Leonel which is Spanish for young lion.  I decided to do a large roaring lion because the first time I was able to see him after my wife’s surgery was he was crying so loud.  The nurses were even shocked at how feisty and loud he was for being so young.  Luckily, after spending 5 weeks in the hospital, he was finally able to come home and is doing great.