Austin Ink

Thus far, my life can be appropriately divided into two The Deathly Hallows-sized chapters. The first, lasting from the time I was forcibly cut from my mother’s womb to about age 16, and second from age 16 until this present moment. The first chapter of my life consisted of an irrational fear of … well, everything. Now, don’t get me wrong I was certainly a happy child growing up. I mean, what four year old boy didn’t garner pure elation from watching the Red Ranger beat the shit out of the Green Ranger when Rita Repulsa held him under mind control? But to say an I had an unusually large amount of worldly trepidation would be putting it lightly.

There was my fear of permanence which prevented me from using temporary tattoos (a real anxiety rouser at birthday parties), my fear of balloons popping (if a balloon pops and nobody sees it, does it feel?), and a deathly, deathly fear of people singing happy birthday to me. For anybody that has a token Mexican friend, you should know any good Mexican birthday must be held as a public park and must have enough attendees to occupy Zuccotti. Imagine if you were a borderline-agorphobic seven year old with 50 of your loudest relatives screaming happy birthday at you! It’s a one-way ticket to throwing your new edition of “Mortal Kombat” back in the gift pile and saying fuck it.

As I got older, my fears remained irrational but allowed me to leave the house in peace. For example, although my fear of pre-mature balding terrified me as an eleven year old, I simply took time to write down all of my hair loss prevention options in my “stuff to look at when I’m old” journal before leaving the house. By high school, my anxiety had mostly become standard of the high schooler far too active in student council (What do you mean Party City is out of blow-up dolphins? Now who the hell is going to come to Homecoming Under the Sea!?) although I was still hard-pressed to be in the presence of refried beans without a significant jump in blood pressure.

Sometime at the beginning of my senior year, I decided my anxiety was making me too anxious and that I should just begin to conquer my fears. When you’re in high school, the end of senior year is equivalent of being pulled off life support and hell, if Morgan Freeman in the “Bucket List” can make his last months of life rewarding why can’t I? In retrospect, I wish I had made a more exciting declaration in the form of an angst ridden blog post or deep heart-heart with a group of my closest friends on the way back from a night that forces youthful reflection like prom. Instead, I think I came to the idea rather suddenly while eating a bowl of Panda Express and figured if it sounded like a good idea and I should just roll with it. A rather blasé and anti-climatic turning point after a life of a fear and emotional eating.

And that’s where it all began. Trying foreign foods (read: not white and starchy), moving across the country for my education (shits cold out East), and fulfilling my dreams of becoming the youngest recipient of a Pulitzer Prize. Well, I didn’t really do that one, but I did have an op-ed I wrote get published in the school paper once. Anyway, then came my study abroad adventure. Who would have thought that little brown kid who was scared to leave his front door would execute a 17-country Euro-adventure complete with skydiving over the Swiss Alps and almost being incinerated by a bomb in Morocco?

My relatively uneventful shift towards a “you only live once attitude” has remained fairly consistent since I made that fateful leap during one of my typical orange-chicken binges. Naturally when I have an opportunity, I seize it and when I have a chance to actively destroy a fear (paying 500 bucks to be forcibly thrown out of a plane is a good way to get over heights) I take advantage of it. As I will elaborate upon in a future blog post, I travelled to Austin, Texas during Thanksgiving to visit my friend Melinda. Austin, (the mecca of hipsters, indie music, and Whole Foods) is known for its artsy, brooding residents, so it’s no surprise that the tattoo scene is fairly prominent.

Which led me to my next goal: overcome my paralyzing fear of tattoos.

I had somewhat come to grips with the permanence of it all, which is surprising considering as a seven year old I couldn’t have Spider Man temporarily tattooed to the back of my hand without considering the serious moral ramifications of my decision. Rather, it’s the mind-numblingly painful sound of a gyrating needle piercing virgin skin that drives me up the wall. Tolerating pain has never been one of my fortes either and in my younger, more violent years, I had a reputation for violently thrashing/kicking/biting any doctor that came at me with vaccination needle. In retrospect, these ordeals probably should have been hashed out in therapy but when trying to stay afloat in the high school food chain, who really has time to discuss years of suppressed anguish?

I digress. Come Turkey day weekend, I set out to conquer my fear. Melinda knew just the right place to get inked as she had done it several months earlier. Similarly tempered and also type-A, Melinda assured me that if she could get inked, so could I. I had gone over my tattoo with her several times. A small, simple quote from my favorite movie: It’s a Wonderful Life. “No man is a failure who has friends” would be permanently etched subtly below my shoulder on my back. Good message, good location, and as sag proof as you can really get. Really what could go wrong?

Well for one, everything. I neglected to tell Melinda several integral facts about the extent of my tattoo knowledge. The first being that I could hardly sit through an episode of LA Ink without vomiting nor had I actually ever seen somebody get a tattoo. A short burst of nerves seems to be a normal reaction to fear, but the inability to control one’s gag reflex in the middle of a perfectly normal discussion amongst friends regarding tattoos may be an indication something more serious is amidst. I’m not quite sure why I thought seeing my “naturally-bronze-because-I’m-Hispanic” skin simultaneously inked and bleed in person would be easier than watching it on TV. But then again, I’m a go big or go home kind of person.

After days of putting it off, we had finally arrived at the opportune moment for my tattoo. Melinda, Chris (her boyfriend), and I all sat in the car. The discussion went somewhere along these lines:

Melinda: So, are you ready?
Me: Yes.
Me: Wait, no. I can’t do, I’m going to puke.
Me: Wait, yes I will. I have to overcome my fear!
Me: But do you like my idea? What if I change my mind? Can they make it small? What happens when I get old?
Me: Does it hurt? Wait, don’t answer that. I don’t want to know.
Me: I don’t do pain. I can’t.
Me: Well, this would be a good time to conquer my fear of pain. And I love the idea of my tattoo so much! I’m going to do it! I’m going to get a tattoo!
Me: Wait, fuck this drive me home. I’m over it!

At which point Melinda drove promptly to the tattoo parlor. As soon as the car went into ignition, my blood started pumping. I could feel each and every fish taco I had consumed that day in my stomach. What if I could handle the pain? What if I didn’t like the tattoo? Would it it be a misdemeanor if in a child like state of reflex, I began violently thrashing and beating the man holding a needle to my back? I began shaking like an ill chihuana, constantly nervous and constantly on the brink of death due to a small heart and fragile nervous center. 10 miles. 5 miles. 1 miles. 3 blocks. Boom. We had arrived.

In a foolish attempt to quite literally run from my problem, I darted down the street away from the parlor and away from the car after we had parked. Unfortunately, I had no other means of transportation home and after standing in the street like a stubborn child for five minutes, I submitted to the will of my friends to at least take a look inside. We entered the venue and it was actually quite nice. Clean floors, relaxing indie music, and the comforting smell of rubbing alcohol that indicated sanitation was taken quite seriously at this place of business. It also could have meant the artists were sneaking sips of Svedka in-between inking rounds but I have more faith in the human race than that.

My bliss lasted for about 3.7 seconds before the sound of buzzing needles paralyzed all of my bodily functions. I began to shake. I began to sweat. I could feel my Maria’s tacos coming up for seconds. Seconds are only ever good if they’re going down the same way! Melinda mumbles some words I don’t remember to a man at the counter. He approaches me. My anxiety is through the roof. Oh God, can’t breath. Oh God, can’t speak. Oh God, I’m not even sure if I believe in God, so who the hell is going to help me now?! He begins speaking and it’s only several seconds later I realize he’s talking at me.

“So what do you want?”
“Oh, me? Uh, oh, um, let’s see. Yeah… a quote? Yeah, a quote.”
“Which one?”
“Um, let’s see… So man. I mean no man. Wait, let’s see. No failure… oh Jesus…”

I HAD FORGOT THE QUOTE. I was so nervous that I had forgot the quote that I was about to have permanetly etched on my skin until the day I died! The tattoo artists gave me an impatient and exasperated look similar to the one my mother makes when my dog shits on the rug. Was I that pathetic? Akin to a canine too stupid for bowel control? It wasn’t until Chris properly relayed my quote was the artist able to begin drafting a mock design.

I stumbled to the corner. I promptly sat down with my hand over my eyes. I proceeded to curl into as far of a fetal position one can go in public without completely looking like a lunatic. Each moment felt like an era as I heard the buzzing continue in the back. Several minutes passed until the poor soul who put together my design came back to speak to me.

“So, here it is. I think it’s the right size, a nice font and design. What do you think?”

I shit you not readers, the mock-up was half of the size of my back. I immediately shut my mouth for fear of puking all over the salon and clenched my teeth as I did my best to stay conscious. The phantom sensation of a thousand needles ramming themselves into my backside sent a river of sweat down my back like it was the fucking Amazon river. I stumbled in place. I knew I had one chance. One moment to orally proclaim my fate or face the wrath of Maria’s Taqueria twice over. In the quickest possible sentence I have ever uttered, my response was as follows:

“WOW WHAT A TATOO LEMME GET YOUR CARD SO I CAN SLEEP ON IT BYE.”

I politely took the man’s guard and immediately dashed for the car. Never has a human being so passionately locked the doors of a motorized vehicle. I demanded Melinda start the car and drive away from this dark, dark place of fear and needles. Adrenaline crashing, nerves a blaze, I fell asleep in the back seat of the car as I came to terms with what I almost did. As we drove into the Texas sunset, I slipped in and out of consciousness. I remember one particularly clear and poignant thought as we speeded through the highway back to Melinda’s childhood.

“Perhaps”, I thought to myself… “Perhaps I should have started off with a temporary tattoo instead.”