I love birds. I adore seeing them hop around the garden, or swoop in the sky in large groups, and I knew that I wanted my second tattoo to be bird related. But I put things off; I twirl ideas around in my mind for months on end never settling on anything. Eventually I settled on crows after one day I was in the car and I saw one in a field, it looked so beautiful with the sun shining on it's feathers. I knew then that I had to have one on my body.
At A Glance Author Sophie Contact Sophie@bme.anon IAM MyDaydream When Three months ago Artist Heath Studio Something Wicked Location Lincoln, Lincolnshire But I still had no artist and no money so I put it off. Fairly soon the artist problem was solved as I was shown Something Wicked on Monks Road. I went with a friend who was wanting a back piece, and I could tell just from the exterior of the shop and looking into the window (it was closed) that this was where I wanted to go.
Skip a few months and I was in a shop where the girl serving me was covered in tattoos. I knew I had a student loan payment coming up soon, so I asked her where she went for her tattoos knowing that it would be possible to pay for a tattoo very soon. Instead of telling me her artist, she recommended Heath at Something Wicked, saying he a lot of her friends went to him. So there it was my idea, an artist and pretty soon there'd be money too.
I decided to head out to see him. It was a warm day and I forgot how far away from me the shop actually was, by the time I got there I just wanted to collapse. But instead I walked past the shop. I had butterflies in my stomach; the idea of having to tell my idea to a stranger daunted me. I was worried he'd say it was rubbish, or laugh at my total inability to explain anything simply. I pushed it out of my mind, and turned round, telling myself that it was easy. And as soon as I opened the door my butterflies vanished.
I looked around the waiting area for a while, it had a few plants and a large black desk scattered in tattoo magazines and flash books. On the walls were some faded photographs of tattoos and it all looked pretty nice. A voice from another room asked if I needed any help, and once I followed the sign saying enquiries to another room I found two men sat on chairs talking. I stood in front of them, I felt like I was in school doing a presentation to the class. I told him my idea; I started with "some crows" before he interrupted me saying crows in quite a shocked voice. I obviously don't look like the crow type of girl! I continued on with my pitch, at the end saying that I didn't want them to be too masculine. He looked worried, and we spent a couple of minutes discussing how we could make crows look feminine.
I'm then told to stand on a chair and get a book about British Birds from the top shelf of books, I felt wobbly since I already had a couple of inches added height in my shoes, but I wasn't going to start complaining. Heath laughed as I got up, questioning how many health and safety regulations were being broken by me doing that, and when I handed him the book glided through it until he came to the right page. We didn't have any luck with the book because they were drawings rather than actual pictures of birds, but he told me that if I printed off lots of pictures of crows in flight then we'd pick the ones that we both felt worked and use those. I asked some final questions about waiting lists and prices and then left the shop, happy that I'd found my shop.
My first stop after the meeting with Heath was the library since it was on my way home. I raided their bird books and left pieces of paper on the pages I wanted photocopied. I left with photocopies in hand and some new information about crows that I found useful to know, and went on my way.
The next day I got up and ready, then headed off again to Something Wicked. This trip didn't seem to take as long, and when I walked through the door I was recognised immediately. I don't think I was expected to have done my homework, and when I pulled out pictures from my back he seemed very happy, and told me that it would mean I wouldn't have to climb on a chair again! We looked through them, and I pointed out the two that I liked the most. Holding up the page to someone else who wanted to ask about tattoos Heath said "so what do you think that is?" The man said a range of birds, none of them right but I wasn't disheartened. I got the feeling this guy could just about tell a pigeon from a flamingo but not much else. More chatting, he drew up a quick sketch of a foot on the bottom of one of the pages and I showed him how I'd like the birds to be positioned, and mentioned that I'd like them to all be slightly different. I had a slight change of plan and decided I only wanted to devote one of my feet to the tattoo, but that was no problem. Out came a big book of his sketches where he showed me a piece he was working on that involved crows. It was impressive, and made me trust him even more. We discussed times that I was available, and he said he had a couple of dates over the second week in May. I took an evening one since he was more comfortable doing it when he knew there would be nobody else waiting. Heath booked me in and I was told that he'd draw up some sketches, but if I had any more pictures I wanted to show him I should just bring them to him. I left feeling super confidant that I'd made the right choice of artist.
The weeks rushed by and I thought nothing more of the tattoo, my ideas were with the artist, and all I had to do was turn up on time on the date we'd planned. I had my friend who would sit in and support me, talk to me and probably laugh if I squealed too much!
Then the day arrived and I was nervous. I made myself a quick tea before I had to leave for my appointment, and on the way to the shop picked up some sweets and drinks to share out and much on to take my mind away from the tattoo while it was being done. I met up with my friend outside the shop and we arrived five minutes early for my slot. Once Heath had finished with his last customer we talked over my idea while he had a cigarette showing me some drawings and pictures he'd found in the other books he had on his shelf. Then he led me through to his room and positioned the table so I'd be comfortable and so he'd be able to work. Already I felt at ease as he made lots of jokes and conversation while he was doing this, asking lots of questions about me and my friend and generally making me feel happy that I'd chosen to go to him.
Then I hopped up onto the table as instructed and positioned my foot around a collection of books he'd laid out to look at. Pen in hand he started creating the birds based on things that he saw on paper, the biggest of my birds being based on my favourites. I looked over everything he did, and was impressed how quickly the birds were created and how good they looked. When I had seven he asked if it looked okay, but I felt there should be one more to make it an even number and because up near my ankle looked a little bare. Once that was drawn and I looked at it properly from a distance I knew that was perfect and couldn't wait for him to start.
He moved the books out of the way and started setting up for the tattoo, getting out bottles of ink, cling film and making sure his machine was working. Then he snapped on his gloves on, put a lump of vaseline on my leg above where he'd be tattooing and applied a thin layer over my foot, which he kept topping up throughout the tattoo which made it sting a little in certain places. The he asked me if I was ready.
I reclined back on the bench which had been positioned so I could be sitting up, I didn't want to look at it being done at first, so instead focused on my friend and the radio. Heath had started on my biggest crow at the front of my foot and when the needle first touched my skin I thought "this isn't so bad". It was a continuous dull pain that was unpleasant but not as bad as I was expecting it to be. But closer towards my big toe where the bone is it started to burn a little, and I got quieter and quieter and started to grip the bench. Eventually I got used to the pain, but each part of my foot felt different, with the top of my foot being the most unbearable part. I sat up to watch it be done, thinking if I knew what was coming I could easily prepare myself for the pain. It was interesting to watch the blue biro ink of the birds get transformed into permanent black, and I couldn't wait for it to be shown off. Half way through my friend mentioned something she'd seen in the waiting room, and deciding we needed a break so Heath could smoke and I could have a break from the process we went to have a look at what she was talking about, and talked about fitting her in afterwards if she had the money on her. Then back to work to finish off the rest of the birds and go back over anything that was looked like it needed finishing. By the end my foot was stinging, it'd only been about 40 minutes worth of tattooing with lots of talking and pauses, but it felt like much longer. My foot ached once he had finished, that stayed with me for a couple of hours although it faded later on in the evening. He wrapped up my foot in cling film once I was finished, and told me that I could take it off in a couple of hours if I wanted, but it would be best to leave it until I went to bed. He suggested several anti septic creams I could use, stating the most important thing was I kept it clean and didn't pick at it.
Then I stood up, and while walking with flat feet stung a little, I found walking on tip toe was painless so spent the next couple of hours gliding around the shop on my toes while my friend got worked on. Eventually I had to return to earth for the walk home, which stung when I put the weight onto the tattooed foot. I was happy we were walking to my friends house then getting a lift to my final destination, I don't think I could have walked for forty minutes that night.
That night I propped my foot up and rolled my trouser leg up so nothing was touching the ink. I left it alone pretty much, and right before bed I took off the cling film and rubbed some tattoo cream my friend had into it then went to bed laid on my front with my foot hanging out from under the sheets. I didn't want it to touch anything.
Over the next couple of days I kept it clean and kept rubbing in the tattoo cream, stayed barefoot when I was in the house and only wore shoes that wouldn't touch the tattoo when I did go outside. This worked for me, although I found the hems of my trousers rubbed on the tattoo a little, so reverted to wearing skirts for a while too. This only lasted for the first week before I was sick of wearing the same two pairs of shoes over and over, but wearing socks wasn't as bad as I was expecting, I was just very careful when I put them on and took them off making sure they didn't catch.
After four or five days I really noticed that it was scabbing up, and was even more careful with it, making sure it didn't get knocked on anything. It stopped hurting after the first night pretty much unless I did catch it or someone touched it by accident. The scabbing stayed for about two weeks after I had the tattoo, and the worst part was the itching, which I tried curing by buying anti itch moisturiser to put on instead of the tattoo cream I'd been wearing before. It helped a little, but most of the time I just tried to distract myself by doing something else.
When the scabs fell off they left behind them a layer of flaky white skin behind that seemed to stay longer, but I think I only noticed this because it was a different colour to the ink. A few real scabs stayed behind for just short of a month, and when they'd finally fallen off my tattoo was looking great. I love looking at them, and think they're beautiful. I've spotted a few areas on some of the birds that need touching up, but I can live with them for now, nobody has noticed yet and as long as I'm not sitting looking for them I can't see them either. It's something that will get fixed in the next couple of months, but can wait for now.