Getting a Tattoo, 2003, George Walker

From MemoryArchive

Who: George Walker
What: Getting a Tattoo
When: 2003
Where: Waco, Texas

When I was 18, I decided to get a tattoo. I had wanted one ever since I was sixteen, and I was pretty sure on what I wanted. I wanted an American flag tattooed on my back. So, one day, about six months after I turned 18, I went over to my friend Matthew’s house, and asked him if he would come with me, because I was nervous. He didn’t think I was serious at first, but I finally convinced him to come.

We decided to shop around to see what place would give me the best price. This turned out to be a bad idea. The first tattoo parlor we went to told me it would cost me 200 dollars for a tattoo of an American flag that was 6 inches by 4 inches. We told them that we would think about it. So then we went to the second tattoo parlor.

The second tattoo parlor seemed alright. We walked in, and everything seemed clean, and there were lots of designs on the walls. We walked up to the counter, and there were books filled with pictures of the four tattoo parlor artist’s work. It looked ok, so I decided this was a good place. I asked how much the price was, and they told me $175. I decided that hey, it was saving 25 bucks, so why not? Bad move. The guy that was available told me I didn’t have to make an appointment, and that I could do it right then and there. I took the plunge, and said ok.

He had me sit in reverse in a folding chair, with my back to him. I could see him out of the corner of my eye getting ready, though. He put the different inks he would use in tiny containers, put on gloves, and then put the needle in the machine. He turned it on, and it sounded a little like an electric razor, except a lot louder. He made sure is was working correctly, and then cleaned my back off with alcohol. Then he was ready.

I could hear the machine before I felt it. And then I felt it, in my upper right back, a little below my shoulder blade. It actually wasn’t that bad at first. It just felt like a light pinch except that it happened over and over. The first thing he was doing was making the red stripes for the flag. It was going ok and didn’t hurt to badly, until he came to my spine. Then, when the needle went over my spine, the pain intensified greatly, to the point that I was gritting my teeth. Then he was off the spine, and it was ok… for awhile.

This went on for a long while. It was the same pattern of not so bad pain, and then bad pain for a few seconds. Eventually, he had most of the stripes done, and he asked me to look in the mirror. My back was a bloody mess. There was blood oozing out in probably 20 places, and he still wasn’t quite done with the stripes. Yikes. He told me he just had to fill in the holes in the red. So I sat back down, and he started to fill it in… the only problem was, he started pushing EXTREMELY hard. It hurt so bad I started to get nauseated. Finally though, he was done with the red. After that, it was on to the hard part.

The hard part was the blue field that the stars would sit in. Stupidly, I insisted that he put every star in, which made it exceedingly difficult for him to get each star shaped correctly. So he started put the blue in. This hurt more than the red though, because the majority of the blue was over a bone, and felt like it did when he was going over my spine most of the time. It was excruciating, and lasted about an hour for the blue, at which point he kept muttering ominous things like, “I dunno man, I don’t like how this is turning out.” After the blue was done, I went in the bathroom and retched. I told him I was going to have to come back to finish the white, and he said that was OK.

The entire process took over 2 and a half hours, and I was oozing blood all over the bandage he put on it. I shouldn’t have gone to the place that was “the best deal,” because he screwed up royally on the stars. In addition, he was seemingly “never available” to finish the white, so I got ripped off. So, I have half of a flag tattooed on my back. The surprising thing is, because he did such a bad job, it actually looks cool. It sort of exemplifies that Old Glory mentality. Anyway, if the person reading this is thinking about getting a tattoo that they want to look good, for god sakes don’t make the price the deciding factor.