1. I've always been surrounded by ink - friends, family and acquaintances - for as long as I can remember - and been fascinated by it.
2. Darrin is not the first man I have dated with tattoos (although he has more than the others!)
3. Since my late 20's I have been talking about getting a tattoo
4. I am finally at the age of 40 getting my ink because a) I've fallen in love with the design I really want, b) I've found the artist I want to do it and c) I've decided to suck it up and get brave around the pain factor.
Now that you know these things, lets get on with my story.
In my early 20's a few of my very close girlfriends got their first (and in some cases their only) ink. At the time I was fascinated and wishing I was brave enough to get one too. They were getting them on the front of their hips and they were small and discrete, in fact most people don't even know they have them except for their partners.
At the time I was still living at home and even though I probably could have got away with it for a while, I wasn't brave enough to face the retribution that might have come with doing such a thing once the parentals found out!. Also too, I've never had the body that would want me having that area tattooed or even on show to get tattooed, so I let the idea go and didn't think about it again for a while.
When I moved out of home of course that was a different story, and I became obsessed with the idea of getting a scorpion on my ankle. I am a Scorpio woman through and through and so it seemed fitting that this would be the design I wanted for my first piece of ink. Something small and kind of abstract, I didn't want a realistic looking arachnid on my body, but a representation. To this day I still have not found a design that I would be happy to have permanently on my skin, so it fell by the wayside again, periodically raising it's head in discussions as friends found images they thought I might like, or we all got brave and talked about making plans to get them done.
But it wasn't just finding the design that held me back. It was fear. The fear of the unknown, of how much it is going to hurt, whether I can handle the pain (my pain threshold is not the greatest!) and a lack of knowledge about how to find my artist.
As an adult I have had 3 men in my life that were either ex-navy or still in the navy and each one of them had ink. Getting inked really does seem to be just as popular with Sailors today as it did back in the day of the legendary Sailor Jerry. All 3 of them had a combination of metal inspired ink or old school imagery and the more I look back at it the more I realise that I actually fell in love with old school tattooing before I even knew what it was!
Whilst the 2 boys I dated had ink - Lift Boy only had 1 and Captain Feathersword around 5, Biker Boy (who was my flatmate's boyfriend) had around 10 or more pieces and I loved to hear the stories when he would come home with another piece of artwork etched into his skin. I loved to hear what the inspiration was and why that particular design was chosen. Of course I would also drill him about who he got to do it and why that particular spot on his body and how much one spot hurt over another!
So when I met Darrin and found out he had 25 (which has now increased to 27 since we have been together!) it was only natural that my thought process and conversations started coming back to my own desires of getting tattooed.
Living with a man who is inked, having tattoo magazines galore around me, now having friends who are tattoo artists and going to conventions did nothing to stem the desire to take my 'clean skin' and make it prettier! Talking to people who are heavily inked, to people who have regretted some of theirs, watching the artists at work, talking to tattooists and hearing stories about how much it hurts (from people like me who don't have the highest pain threshold) has done nothing to quell the desire, in fact it has done the opposite and fanned the flames!
As I said earlier, I still haven't found the design for a scorpion tattoo which is totally fine. My fascination with old school imagery is so strong that I'm devouring magazines and web pages galore and have been researching intently for the perfect designs.
With Darrin having so much ink himself and being in the industry with his photography, his knowledge in my quest to find the perfect piece and the artist to do it have been invaluable.
When you are going to spend hundreds of dollars putting a permanent in-print onto your skin, you want to know that you have the best possible person doing that. His only influence over my upcoming adventure has been to guide me away from artists whose work I loved the look of, but when looked at with a trained eye were actually filled with shoddy line work or bad shading etc - I need to know my art is going to be beautiful so I happily listened! Or he rightly so also guided me away from a few artists whose work was beautiful but they are biker owned shops. That scene I don't need to be a part of nor be giving my hard earned cash to.
So he has patiently looked at web page after web page I have sent him, photos and mock ups as I spent months coming up with my final design. He patiently found me details of amazing artists that complete the kind of old school work that I'm interested in and unknowingly provided a large part of the inspiration behind my chosen design.
I've been lucky enough to have seen 3 of the 4 artists I would really like to get tattooed by in action at the various conventions that we have been to. I've seen not only how beautiful their work is from start to finish but I've had the chance to see how they treat their clients as well and so when it came to choosing my final artist for piece number one, I had no hesitations in booking in once I saw the drawing she had created for me.
I'm guessing you are wanting to know about my design - so I'm going to tell you how I chose it, why I chose it and where and why this piece is going where it is. If you're lucky I might also show you the dodgy mock-up I created to explain to Jane what I was wanting!
When my beautiful Nanna Lucas passed away 4 years ago, I knew that when the time came for me to finally get inked that I at some point wanted some kind of memorial to her. At first I had thought that it might be in the shape of a flower - perhaps an Asian lily with her dates in the petals. That was my first thoughts. Then when I had my Amy Winehouse costume for a fancy dress party, I fell in love with her bird tattoo which says 'never clip my wings'. It was so appropriate for me in the wording, and I loved the little sparrow and I thought perhaps I could incorporate Nan into that somehow. Of course, I didn't want to steal Amy's tattoo design completely, if I went with a bird then it still had to be of my own design but I didn't know how to make that happen.
Then just after Christmas when Darrin came home from his family he brought home to me what is now one of my most treasured items of jewellery. A beautiful little silver swallow brooch, it's wings spread as it soars up high. It is a gorgeous pin that belonged to his beautiful mum whom sadly had passed away a few months before I met him. So not only is it treasured because of what it is, but from where it came to me from. Now whilst this swallow is only an outline, it got me back onto thinking about birds and swallows in particular.
You see traditionally, sailors got swallow tattoos because the swallow was often the first bird to land on a ship as it approached land and it reminded them of home and their loved ones waiting for them there. In Estonian legend (not that I'm Estonian - but I appreciate this bit of history!) the swallow also represents free blue sky and eternal happiness. Swallows also migrate home every year, no matter where they are and they are also birds that represent love as unlike a lot of other birds, the swallow mates for life. So, as a girl who is very close to her family and loved ones having a swallow tattooed on me seemed to be a logical choice :)
But that wasn't enough! I didn't just want a swallow that would represent my Nan, my family, my friends, my man - all the people that I love. I wanted to symbolise how much they are always in my heart and will be for eternity. And so my final design incorporates a heart with the world 'Eternal' in it and a ribbon that links the heart to a swallow on either side of it - top and bottom.
This is the very bad mock up and nothing like the gorgeous drawing that Jane has done where the birds have so much personality! I also haven't quite settled yet on the colours we will use -we will do that on that day :)
The tattoo originally started out as quite a small piece that I had planned to put on my inside left wrist, but with the advice of the people I trust, to get the detail I want in it and have it staying beautiful over time I have had to let go of my ideas of a 'small' tattoo and go for something bigger. So then I thought if it's going to be bigger, let's move it a little higher, still on the left arm but closer to my elbow, make it easier to cover when I need to (and I will need to sometimes for work when I'm customer facing and training), but somehow over time even that changed and my beautiful drawing when I saw it ready for my arm is now pretty much going to take up the entire inside of my left forearm! But that's OK, because to be honest, if I handle the pain well, there are so many other ideas I have for the next pieces and if I end up with a half sleeve, or even a full one, then so be it! I think that tattoos when done well on the arms can look incredibly beautiful and sexy, and I'm old enough to make my own ink decisions and understand the consequences of where I put them :)
So why did I chose my arm when I could go with so many other places that I could keep them hidden and the world wouldn't know?
Well for me, if I'm going to do this, I want to be able to see it. And this one especially, because it has so much meaning to me, I don't want to hide it. Sure there will probably be others that I may get that I will put in less obviously places (I have ideas for a thigh piece, that will pretty much only get seen at the beach or by Darrin and I) but for me, I wouldn't be happy putting something on my back and then just knowing it is there. Now that doesn't mean I don't like them there - I've seen lots of gorgeous ink on people's backs. it's just on my body, I want to be able to see them for myself.
Now as for my artist, this has been a task way greater than deciding on my final design! There are so many tattooists out there, and regretfully there is a lot of dodgy workmanship too. Because of me loving the old school imagery so much, the pool of talent that specialises in my kind of ink is smaller, so making the decision really came down to who was going to be the best for this particular design.
I was fortunate to have seen Jane tattoo at the Sydney convention and when I researched her further I absolutely adored the way she drew her swallows. When we had our initial meeting she really listened and I knew she understood what I was after. When I then got the see the drawing a few weeks ago it was even more gorgeous than I had envisaged, so I knew I was making the right decision going with her.
If you want to check out her work at all you kind find her here: http://www.janestuart.com.au/ or on facebook www.facebook.com/janesstuarttattoo where you can see samples of her gorgeous work.
I have other 'tattoo idols' though of course that I would love to get work done by in the future (of course EVERYTHING depends on how I manage the pain with this one!! But let's imagine I'm going to be fine and will be getting more!) and they are Toby Gawler from Shanghai Charlie's here in Sydney, Zoe Dennis from Third Eye Tattoo in Melbourne and Mimsy Gleeson from Mimsy's Trailer Trash Tattoo in QLD. They all do different elements of the old school tattoos that I like :)
So here we are, in less than 30 sleeps at 11:00am on August 11, I am going to be in the studio and being prepped for my stencil to go on. I'm excited and scared at the prospect. Darrin is pretty sure I'm going to cry! Oh well, if I cry, I cry. I'm definitely no stranger to tears! They are great for stress release :)
That is where we are at, counting down to something that has me scared and excited all at the same time!
Will I post about the actual tattoo experience and show you the pics? - you betcha I will! And I promise, none of those 'it doesn't hurt' stories either - if it hurts like a bitch I'm going to tell you all about it!
Until then, I remain yours, a clean skin (for a little bit longer)
Danielle xxx
