I was inspired to write this rant after a friend of mine asked me..." so Kim, ya got any tattoos yet?" At first I was insulted, *pout* everyone knows that only biker type chicks get tattoos, and was THIS the way my friend thought of me? ughhhh!!!! *feelings sooo hurt* But then the more I thought about it...it was really a legitimate question for this day and era, so I then proudly replied "NO WAY!!!" *strut*
I've been looking around at our young adults, and older adults, (or oversized kids, depending on who we're talking about) and I suppose I should feel grateful that I, so far, have escaped high peer pressure without a tattoo. Nowadays, it seems like an adolescent,young adult, middle age adult, whatever... needs a tattoo to gain entrance to the Cool Club...*eye roll* I'm not exactly sure what the rules are to this club though... Does the tattoo have to be visible during job interviews? Does it matter if it's in color? Why not just get an extra nose ring and forego the whole experience alltogether?
We all understand the perils of peer pressure. When I was a teen, peer pressure compelled so many of my friends to start smoking. Twenty plus years later, it compelled them to stop. Like smoking, tattoos are meant to be permanent. I'm just wondering if kids really understand this. My son has a friend who's father wears on his forearm the tattoo of an L.A. Kings logo that has already changed. I once met a girl who got a tattoo of her boyfriend's name, "David," on her hip. She broke up with David 6 months later, married Steve and is still sporting "David" on her hip, wonder how Steve feels about another man's name living on his wife's hip? *raised eyebrow*
If you visit Pensicola Beach, (Front Beach Rd), or State Street in Ventura or Any Street in Hollywood, you will find a network of tattoo and perforation parlors: Billy Bob's Body-Ka-Bob, Rebel Rick's Skinustrations, The All-Night Mutilate and Dye. We can't blame these businesses. They are just playing their role in the ever-simple cycle of supply and demand. Kids are tattooing and piercing every last inch of their person. They're even piercing their epiglottises (epiglotti?) What are they going to do when they run out of skin, start on their pets?
I don't really understand the attraction of a tattoo...but so many kids and adults these days do, Sometimes when my kids come home from a night out I feel compelled to check their bodies to make sure while they were out they didn't stupidly fall prey to the overwhelming pressures of body art...instead I have secretly become a body watcher to see if either one of my kids are favoring any part of his/her body, I'm depending on the after pain of a million obtrusive needle holes in their bodies to give it away. The permanence of a tattoo is itself the allure. Cool is the willingness to make a lifelong decision over a dare on Saturday night. The only problem is that teenagers are unfit to make lifelong decisions. They are driving under the influence of hormones. (believe me, I know this first hand, I have two of them) Teenagers are their own breed! Their belief systems are convulsing just below the surface. And its cruel and silly for us to ask these kids, whom are ready, willing and able to add ink and holes all over their bodies, to choose their careers, of all things, at this time? Heck, now-a-days it seems some 17-year-olds still think they'll grow up to be a Power Ranger. (btw...the new wave power ranger has a tongue stud)
To add insult to injury, tattoos are expensive. A half-inch rose costs a hundred bucks. A nipple ring *cringe* (parts and service) costs $75. Tommy Lee wears about $15,000 worth of tattoos and those are just on the parts you don't see on the video. Yet, kids keep finding the money to fund and feed this obsession.
I guess where ever your tattoo resides on your body is where you store your coolness now, these tattoos will occupy the same tired space year after year, reflecting a mindset long since evolved, brain cells that have been replenished many times over. After a while, a tattoo says, "I made a mistake, sue me." Have you ever seen a 70-year-old man with an AC-DC tattoo? It isn't a pretty sight....*laugh*
And these people don't understand that Tattoos are not licked off by kittens, either. It takes cosmetic surgery and a truckload of money. I researched laser clinics on the Internet, where I found disclaimer statements, financing options, post-surgery scarring and color variation... Some decisions in life just don't come with an undo button. The reason for my reserching was because my husband, while over in Vietnam, (acutally Hong Kong), with several buddies whom none of which remember the night or the tattooing, each got one. My husbands sits not-so proudly on his upper left arm, reading, of all things, "Born To Be Wild" (a popular saying in the late 60's, early 70's) He doesn't like it and never wears anything that allows it show.
If you're a teenager thinking about getting a tattoo, I ask you to reconsider your decision. I don't think tattoos are wrong or sinful and I know the guys think the chicks dig it, and the chicks think the guys dig it, (most do anymore), I just think that one day you'll look in the mirror and wonder what the heck you were thinking. It's like giving yourself a birthmark that you didn't need to have. And just as Gorbachev would have never tattooed that pink bird dropping onto his forehead if given the choice, we don't have to dye our skin or brand ourselves with a hot iron to get into the Cool Club. Everyone knows that you can still always get in by greasing the doorman a twenty....or just hang around with me..*wink*
until next time......
STILL INK FREE!!
- Kim Gallagher-
