Angry Ink

Cover Your Mouth Instead!

A young lady came into the shop with two good-sized black and grey bows beneath her collarbones. They weren't horrible, but they weren't nice. One was bigger than the other, one was placed on crooked. They were far too dark and the outlines were choppy. She said she wanted them covered up, and she had a photo on her phone of what she wanted. I said, sure, let's have a look-see. She shows me the photo, and it's a very traditional 'cabbage rose' style design. I told her that it wouldn't work too well as a coverup, on account of the lack of dark shading, and what with the open areas on the design, the old tattoo would show right through. I said she really needed a different style rose. She asked me, "What about the same style rose?" I looked at her in confusion and told her that one she had on her phone just wasn't going to work.She didn't seem to like that answer, but you can't always get what you want when you're getting a coverup, you have to get something that's going to work.

I got up and directed her to one of the flash racks. I flipped to a page of more realistic style roses and pointed one out. I began to trace over the linework with my finger, explaining to her why this style would work better and what I could do to help her out. She got huffy and said "I don't like that style!" I told her that the problem with coverups is that you don't always get your first choice, sometimes you gotta be flexible to get the coverup taken care of. She said that she didn't care about the color, then, just do the same rose she had on her phone, in black. I explained to her that it was going to look terrible, she already had one tattoo she didn't like, then she was going to have something worse. The color, or lack of, wasn't the issue, it was the design itself, it just wasn't going to work.

She asked me if I could make a vine to cover the bows. Let me explain this to you this way, kids: Take a piece of paper and draw a rectangle about two by three inches. Color it in all black with a Sharpie marker. Then take a green marker and make a green stripe across it, make the stripe about a half inch wide. So...did it cover up the tattoo? No. You still have a giant fucking black square. That is exactly how coverups work. You're not paintng over something like you would on a wall, it's like drawing on paper with markers. The new stuff just gets sucked into the paper with the old stuff. The only thing that covers black is more black. And this was what I was trying to explain to this crazy cunt.

She was getting more and more worked up every time I told her that what she wanted wasn't going to work, it wasn't going to look like what she expected. I don't take peoples' money and then throw any old tattoo on them and kick them out the door. When extremely dark-skinned people come in here and want pale pinks and yellows in their tattoo, I tell them no. I explain why, and guide them towards something that will work better for their skin type. They get a tattoo that wasn't what they originally had in mind, but it works. It looks good, they're pleased, I'm pleased, I get paid, they feel that it's money well spent and we all live happily ever after. That's just the way it goes. Remember this, kids: If you go into a tattoo shop asking for something, and the artist tells you it's not going to work, explains to you why not, then offers a solution that will work, YOU LISTEN. They are not trying to be a dick, they are trying to keep you from flushing your money dow the toilet, making you unhappy with the finished product, and bringing a bad reputation to the shop. But I digress.

She asked if the rose could be the same size as the bows. I said no, and began to explain why. She quickly cut me off. "I don't want it to be that big!" She snapped.

I took out a piece of paper and sketched her bow on it and began to shade it in. "So, when you have a tattoo you're trying to cover, the new tattoo can't be smaller than the old one, it has to be bigger. I'll show you this," and I began to sketch the rose over the bow. "So, what happens is-"

She cut me off again. "Can't you just make the rose on one half of the bow, and then over here make a vine?" She seethed, jabbing her finger at the paper. Back to the vine again. So she would have a rose with a big black box next to it. The vine would have to be all coiled up like a snake to cover a square, so it wouldn't look like a vine, and the green wouldn't cover up the black anyway. And I couldn't get her to shut the hell up for two second so I could draw it out on paper and show her what would work.

"Well, no, here's what you should--" I didn't have the words out of my mouth before she was shaking her head, violently. "No. No. No. No." She said. "C'mon," she snapped at her friend, grabbing her by the arm. "Let's go."

She shoved the door open with a football-style stiffarm, her face pinched with rage. "Asshole," she barked as she exited onto the street.

Asshole?

Asshole.

I've been doing this for ages, have seen every type of coverup there is, from the horendous to the nightmarish to the kind that will make you suicidal. I've done coverups that have made my co-workers pin me in a corner after the fact and DEMAND I explain to them how I was able to make it work. It's not an easy thing to do, a good amount of the time, I surprise myself with some fo the Hail Marys I pull off. But it's what I do. And to come in here, to this place, to tell me how I'm gonna do this, ignoring my advice when I'm trying to help you? You already have two shit tattoos that you hate because you went to some know-nothing jackass, but you want to argue with me about how to best do my job....and then call me an asshole? No, lady. YOU are the asshole. You are the ignorant bug snatch who shopped for the cheapest price and then got jacked up in the process. You are the stupid idiot who obviously has no clue what looks good and what doesn't, judging by your first tattoos. You don't do this for a living, yet you want to tell someone who does where to get off, because they're trying to help you not make another mistake. And then you heap on the last insult by calling me a name.

Let me tell you something. Nowadays we have to behave ourselves in the shop, we can't handle things like we used to, and it's unfortunate. In the old days, I'd have followed you out to the door, grabbed your little stick arm and hauled you back inside after I locked the door. I'd have slapped that word right out of your filthy, cocksucking mouth until you apologized. Then I'd have taken your piece of shit smartphone (which cost far more than your tattoo since your priorities are right in the toilet), and smashed it under the heel of my shoe. Then I would have handed you the crushed remains of your phone, dragged you to the door by your collar, and tossed you onto the sidewalk. And I'd tell you to spread the word to all your little hoodrat friends that they're gonna show respect when they come in here.

But things don't work that way anymore. It's not 1952, it's 2011 and the frivolous lawsuit has destroyed tattooing even more than reality TV has. I can't go around alley-whipping people who come in here and treat me like I'm some worhtless piece of crap who's duty-bound to kiss their asses just because they walked in and started making silly demands. I wouldn't need or want to handle things in such a manner very often, just every now and then. But I can't do it. And it's too bad. But I do get to write a snotty blog about it, I guess that's the next best thing.

Smarty Pants

So I'm settling in to tattoo a guy, I could best describe him as one of those 'Dad' guys. You know. The guys who are always in the Sears ads for Wrangler jeans and such. No coincidence that this happened on Fathers' Day. Crewcut with a goatee, y'know, so he could keep a little 'edge'. Pleated-front, plaid, knee-length shorts, deck shoes sans socks, polo shirt, that type. The kind of guy who would be the preppy villain in an '80s comedy movie if he were 22 years old. So, now he plays golf, has a dead-end job in middle management, and drinks two beers too many and hits on his daughter's friends at her graduation party. You know, that guy.

So, I'm settling in to tattoo him, and after a minute, he asks me, "So....where is Tattoo University?" Now, imagine he sounds like Lumberg from Office Space. I was wondering if he was gonna ask me for the TPS reports next. No shit, he really had that sorta condescending voice, like he was asking me that question as if he were about to deliver a punchline, or if he was trying to see if I was really stupid. So I answered him back, "There is no tattoo school."

He scoffed. "Really! So, it's just all, like....you're working...and-"

I cut him off. "You apprentice with someone."

"Who also has no education," he sneered.

I sighed and let off the pedal. "How does one become an electrician?" I asked. "You don't go to school, you become an apprentice. You train on the job with a master electrician. It's just like that."

"Ohhhhh, I suppose," He replied coolly. I glanced up from his bicep as I got back to work, only to see him sneer in disapproval. I dug in a little harder and said casually, "You know, I have two college degrees."

"Really?" he asked, perking up, as if he were relieved that I was, in fact, not one of the ignorant masses. "In what?"

"Commercial illustration, and graphic design. And you know what? My house is full of portfolios and paintings that are covered in dust because none of it meant jack shit and I make way more money doing this. How about that?"

He pressed his lips together and slumped back in the chair a bit as I kept going. I didn't speak another word, and, thankfully, neither did he.

Look, people, let me explain something to you. This is another symptom of these fucking tattoo "reality" shows. Everyone thinks we're all a bunch of uppity-ass art school grads. People like myself, up until ten years ago, were a total anomaly. For a long time, I was actually considered a joke by most of my co-workers for having an education. I have spent most of my career working with high school dropouts and ex-cons, and most of them can tattoo circles around me. While I was dicking around in school, hoping to break into advertising, my contemporaries were soldering needles under the watchful eye of a grizzled, chain-smoking old schooler. I had the fortune to be taken in as an apprentice by the same kind of guys, who overlooked my credentials and gave me a shot anyhow. I was told that my smarty-pants, highfalutin' art bullshit had no place in tattooing, and they were correct. I still maintain to this day that all my art education didn't do one thing to make me a better tattooer. But tattooing sure as hell made me a better artist. I'm not sorry I went to school, but if I knew then what I knew now, I might debate attending a bit.

Nowadays, people go to art school with the expressed intention of tattooing after they graduate, and good for them, I wish them the best of luck. But let me impress upon you, there is no advantage whatsoever to going to art school as far as tattooing goes. One of the best damn tattoo artists I ever saw was an apprentice for about a year, right after he got out of prison. Now he's gracing magazines, getting offers from all over the country for jobs, people travel several time zones to get worked on by him. And yet, some people almost crap themselves when they find out he never went to college, and they question his ability. In fact, I don't know if he even finished high school, and so what? He's brilliant. His portfolio is stunning. His work after two years is staggeringly better than mine was after ten. He just has a gift, and gifts aren't taught, they're innate. If a portfolio of knock-out tattoo work means less to you than some bullshit piece of paper with a university seal on it in regards to your tattoo artist, you watch way too much television.