Inked

So on Monday I went in prepared to get my tattoo on my wrist.

"I want a tattoo," I said to the guy behind the counter. He asked me what I wanted and I explained it. I wanted it in script, but he explained that it probably wouldn't fit and he pointed out another kind of lettering that was smaller. It was more blocky, but he said it could be stylized to make it more feminine. That was fine because I have the world's smallest wrists and if he thought script wouldn't fit on a regular wrist it definitely wouldn't fit on mine. So I set up an appointment for Tuesday afternoon because he didn't have time to do it Monday.

On Tuesday Andy and I got there and he had been working on drawing it out. It was too big for my wrist. So he shrunk it a little. It was still too big, but it could work. I sat there and stared at that stupid piece of tracing paper for five minutes trying to figure out a way to either make those letters smaller or make my wrist bigger. Also, I really just hated the letters. They didn't look like me once I saw them all spelled out and I wasn't going to put them on my body for the rest of eternity.

So we started talking about alternate locations. After much indecisiveness on my part (mostly an internal battle) I just told myself, "Joanna, suck it up and make a decision." And that's what I did.

So I have a tattoo on my lower abdomen/right hip.

I love it.

The location has certainly had to grow on me since I went in hell bent on my wrist. Obviously I got it in black because the guy flat out refused to do it in any other color. But never fear! Now that it's there and I know I like it I have plans to add some colorful embellishments in the future.

About the pain. It really wasn't so bad. And here is the funny thing: I never even anticipated the pain. I think because I know I've felt so much worse and the whole time I was making this decision it never even entered my mind that it might be kind of uncomfortable to get a tattoo. Julie and I even had a conversation before my appointment about what we'd heard about tattoo pain, but the idea of me being in pain because of it never even became a factor.

Not until I was laying there on the table and he had the tool in his hand and started to talk to me about relaxing and not being tense because that would make it worse and that's about the time my brain went, "Oh shit! This is going to hurt, isn't it?!" Um, yeah. I guess at that point I still could have backed out, but we had put down a non refundable deposit to hold my appointment spot and there was no way I was letting that money go. One of us was leaving there with a tattoo and since I was already on the table it only made sense for me to do it.

In all seriousness I never even considered backing out. My moment of panic was just that, a moment. Because in the next second I said to myself, "Suck it up you big baby. This can't possibly be as bad as anything that happened last year and it certainly won't last as long."

I love my tattoo. I'm glad I did it. And I would do it again.