Ever since I was little I've been fascinated by tattoos. I think this probably stems from my Dad as he has some proper old school tats on his forearms and I've always been curious about them; why, when, where? How much did it hurt?! I love seeing and hearing stories about all body mods, even though I only have a few myself, I think it really tells you something about a person. My Dad says he regrets having his tattoos for various reasons, but I can't imagine his skin without them. They are definitely a part of him.
At A Glance Author Leese Contact iamleese@hotmail.com When A year ago Artist Glyn Studio Twilightzone Tattoo Location Glastonbury, England From about the age of 14/15 I became more aware of other peoples' tattoos (not just my Daddy's) and formed opinions about those people. Any body modification is a statement about yourself and I wanted to say something about myself! Obviously because of my age it wasn't possible to get anything of good quality done because all the clean, decent, respectable tattoo places abide by the law. So I just talked and thought about about it... My Dad was not impressed by my grand ideas! He didn't want me to make the same mistake as he had and end up regretting my ink, which actually made me want one even more because I was thinking so carefully about it.
My 18th birthday came round and I knew it was time to make my statement. Because of all the time I had spent thinking about it, I had many ideas about what I wanted, where, how big, what colour? After a few different designs, mostly insects, I decided I'd like a butterfly. I spent a lot of time thinking about the meaning of this; what it would represent, what people would think of me... In the end, it turns out I was doing it for purely aesthetic reasons. I wanted something pretty! At only 18 years of age I haven't experienced much of the world and trying to find a some deep meaningful reason for my ink was just silly. But it would become a part of me, just like my Dad's ink...
So I finalised my design, a black, quite intricate, butterfly. Simple but pretty. I had a tough time deciding where I wanted my tattoo. Hip, bottom of neck, wrist..? In the end I chose to have it on the left hand side of my body, high on my ribs. A private place, ensuring my tattoo would be quite personal. I then needed to find an artist to tattoo me. I had heard good things about Twilightzone so looked on their website... It's a pretty basic site, with a good description of the tattooing process and personal notes from Glyn the tattoo artist and also Wendy, the piercer. I needed to see more of the artwork so my boyfriend and I decided to go and check the place out. We drove to Glastonbury and found the place, a small, clean shop. We had a look on the walls and liked what we saw. Wendy came out and was very friendly. We showed her our designs (my boyfriend was also going to get a tattoo) and she was really helpful, offering to sort the lines out on my boyfriends design which was still quite rough and altering mine slightly. We got a really good feel for the place so we decided to book an appointment. They were jam packed for the rest of the week, a very popular studio.
A week later we went back and I have to say I definitely had butterflies in my stomach! We had booked our sessions one after the other and I wanted to go first to get the pain out of the way... But because my boyfriend had left his design with them, Wendy asked if he'd go first because they were already set up for him! So we went in together, met Glyn and relaxed a bit. Glyn was really friendly and put us at ease. He was careful with the positioning of my boyfriends stencil to avoid having to tattoo over any moles or whatnot and then they got started. I did giggle a bit seeing my boyfriends face when Glyn went over some sensitive parts but I knew I was next!
After my boyfriend was finished we all had a break and cleaned up. Seeing what a good job Glyn had done I got very excited. We spent some time figuring out how I would lie to keep my arm out of the way. The stencil went on Glyn asked me to check that it was positioned right. He was spot on. We joked a bit that I was a brave girl getting my first ever tattoo on my ribs, but even though I was nervous I felt comfortable in Glyn's hands. I lay back in the chair and put my left arm over my body so my skin wasn't too stretched and Glyn could work easily on it. Then we started! It wasn't half as bad as I thought it would be, just a deep dragging/scratching sensation. The most pain came when the needle went over my boney bits, I kept pretty still and just gripped the chair! Glyn was chatty and cheerful, offering sugary mints and checking if I needed a break. Wendy also popped in a couple times, chatting and having a look. Reassuring me that girls are much tougher than men! I sat for about 50 minutes and by the time it was over I hardly noticed the pain. The worst bit was trying to move after lying so still, with my arm in such a weird position it had gone dead. I took a look in the mirror and was so pleased! Everyone agreed that it was a beautiful piece of work and Glyn even took a photo. He also said I got the gold star for bravery for the day! I went to pay, fully satisfied and with strict aftercare instructions. Wendy knocked some money off the original price we had agreed which was a bonus and we all decided it was a very successful day.