Beauty is pain

And frankly, I think it's a bit overrated for the most part. But for the beauty I have gained with my new tattoo, I'll gladly take the pain that went along with it and the pain that continues through the healing process.

After being frustrated most of the morning and early afternoon with long lines at various places I needed to go to run my errands, at 2 p.m. I sat down in my tattoo artist's chair, and she worked her magic on me. Four hours later as the sun was beginning to go down, we were finished, at least for now, and I have never been happier.

She took the design that I had given her and added some of her own personal touches to it as well as cleaning up the lines here and there. For example, the flat, side-on rose that was in one portion of the picture was now much more lush and a whole lot more three-dimensional as well as facing nearly head-on. Seeing as how I chose her for her abilities with roses, I was pretty tickled about it.

The stencil was as big as I thought it was going to be, but when it actually went on my back, hoo nelly, was it a whole lot bigger than I thought. But I was so in love with the design, it didn't really matter to me at all. And by the time she got done drawing on me after applying the stencil to make it flow better with the curves of my body, I had a drawing that went across the back of my shoulders from one bra strap to just under the other, venturing up on my neck on one side, and peeking over my shoulder on the other. Damn. So much for a small design on the back of my neck, eh?

She started outlining, and it was a bit more of a shock than I had anticipated. Time definitely soothes over previous pains, and it certainly did in this instance. Either that or there are a whole lot more "ow" places where this tattoo went than did the one around my ankle. The side of my neck, my spine and the top of my shoulder blade were the worst spots. Thankfully, I was able to stay completely still for her and made it easy for her to get her work done as quickly as possible without rushing things.

We took a break once the outlining was done. The Husband showed up at around this point and while he was a bit shocked at the sheer size of the piece, he totally loved what was being done. He skedaddled to take the girls home and get chores started and my artist went about the business of coloring me in.

Unfortunately, my skin was far too irritated at this point to take the green ink properly, so we decided to stop that color and instead do it when I go back in for touch-ups in about a month. But the rest of the colors took beautifully - blue, pink, orange, white and rose. I was bandaged up, got my care instructions, paid and tipped her and headed out the door.

The tattoo started its peeling phase yesterday, and is doing quite well with the moisturizing regime I am using and it seems that I am healing very quickly. It still feels like a sunburn and some areas are a bit red, but my ankle tattoo did the same thing so I'm not worried. I'll put a little bit of cortisone cream on it tonight to help it in that direction, but otherwise all is going well.

The Husband liked the artwork so much that he made an appointment for this Friday to get a wolf tattoo done by my artist. He wasn't anticipating getting another tattoo ever, but seeing the work she did and me having in hand the perfect piece of artwork for him made him decide otherwise. And who knows, I may get the same tattoo as he does on Friday as well - the piece is two wolves snuggling together and is a perfect celebration of our marriage. We'll see how it goes, though.

I'll post pictures of the completed tattoo once I get my touch-up done. It looks a bit funky with only some of the green in the leaves and you just don't get the full impact of what it is like otherwise. But it's beautiful, and I'm totally in love with it. I look at my right shoulder, see the tendrils that are now drawn there and think "Gosh! That's there permanantly. How cool!"

Thanks, Michelle. You do great work. I'll be seeing a whole heck of a lot more of you in the future. Here's to the start of a wonderful relationship!