Post-familial disintegration, I found myself quite often at loose ends and with time to contemplate…read morethe larger questions of existence - why are we here? What is the meaning of life? Where did this funny pink lump come from? - and so to fill up the space I took to excessive coffee, a rigid abstinence from alcohol, and a commitment to doing some "serious writing" every day (two or three years on and of those three, only an addiction to coffee remains a constant). However, during periods without caffeine and when I was all wrote-out, I got to thinking about a mid-life crisis proper. With a son and shared custody, selling the car and purchasing a motorcycle was appealing but a non-starter given the ex-missus's shrill tendency to risk aversion, and although I used to sail as a boy, I've no love for all that bollocks these days.
So I went and got a tattoo instead. Two in fact.
I have long wondered about what I might like indelibly inked onto my skin and have until recently come up blank (literally). But several influences, notably Ray Bradbury's The Illustrated Man and a chap I once knew called Pete, led me to consider something that would capture a particular point in time, a critical juncture and what I was feeling, something abstract but loaded with meaning, to me at least. But I couldn't think of anything.
I plumped instead for two pieces of advice, stolen unapologetically and without originality from two of my favourite authors, both reminding me not to do anything stupid in future. Ironically, when quizzed by a charming elderly lady about why I might permanently spoil my skin in this way, on providing this rationale in my defence, she remarked that it was "too bloody late for that my laddo."
And so to the meat of the dish. Neither tattoo took long to do, nor was particularly tricky for an artist as accomplished as Justin, and not once did I feel in the entire process that I was an idiot or that the guys at Valkyrie were in any way sitting in judgement on my life choices. They were extremely helpful, kind, clean and supportive with lots of after care advice, and the two tattoos together cost less than £100. If you do feel like having a cluster of needles rip into your flesh hundreds of times in the pursuit of intrinsic meaningfulness, or so you can show off your hipster credentials at the beach / swimming pool, I can think of no better place to get it done.
