Getting anxious, I start to trace my fingers over the cursive on my arm, feeling the black ink that is embedded into my skin forever. Feeling the rough swelling of the words, and the smoothness of the magenta lotus flower. Thinking of the stinging of the tattoo. Jogging my mind back to the day I got it. Thinking of what the cursive quote means starts to put me more at ease. Knowing that the tattoo is there, I know that he'll always be there with me. Getting to look at it forever is what I love the most about it.

January 19th, 2018 around 2:45 pm I parked into the black cracked up parking lot of Thriller Ink. Getting out of the car, I could feel my nerves start getting worked up. Walking in, the bell that is hanging from the top of the silver door starts to ring. You can hear the rock music blaring throughout the studio, and the buzzing noise of the tattoo machine going off. You can smell the fresh ink being scared into the pale skin of the curly headed guy that is laying flat on his stomach. My eyes wander from the two different rooms, they're both filled with black leather tattooing chairs, a rainbow variety of ink colors, and of the framed artwork hung on the wall. In the corner of the small studio, I noticed a gumball machine that was filled up with old discoloration of gum. After all of my gawking, a guy that is covered in colorful tattoos walks up to me, and I start to get butterflies in my stomach, from getting all of my nerves worked up.

As the guy that was wearing a red flannel shirt, that was rolled up to his elbows walks towards me. I could start to feel my palms to get sweaty. He seemed intimidating with his arms crossed showing off all of his tattoos, his muscles bulging, showing no emotion at all, looking me dead in the eye. I looked up at him as he stared down at me. Standing three feet away, I could smell the strong scent of his cologne. I knew he could sense my fear from a mile away. I knew he could tell I was nervous since he took his guard down and showed the nicer side of him. After he got all of the information about the tattoo I wanted, he took around twenty minutes to draw it up. Once he got the drawing, the ink, and the chair situated, he had me walk back and had me take a seat on the cold leather chair, with my arm propped up. Right when I sat down I became as stiff as a board, not wanting to ruin anything.

I started to become really antsy when I feel him wiping my arm down with a cold alcohol wipe. The hairs on my arms started to stick up, my palms were filling up with sweat, and I was looking anywhere but at my arm when he laid down the outline of the beautiful lotus flower tattoo with a poem as the stem on my arm. I tried to block out the buzzing of the tattoo gun that was about to attack my arm. I was biting my lip preparing for the pain that was about to come, thinking about jumping up and not following through with getting a tattoo. But once the needle started to scar my arm with the black ink of the poem, I realized it wasn't that bad, and started to peak over to see it. Once I started to watch him smoothly move the buzzing gun across my arm I found it satisfying to watch. Once he was finished, he poured a clear, shiny, cold liquid that was in a clear bottle over my freshly scared tattoo and wiped it off with a thick paper towel. After taking many pictures and gawking at my new beautiful tattoo, he wrapped it up so no bacteria could get into it. That day is a day that I will never forget.

January 19, 2018 is a day that I will never forget. I still remember what exact tattoo I wanted and where. I knew I wanted a tattoo that would commemorate my dad in a way. I still recall how nervous I was, and how I wanted to back out multiple times. I can still remember the stinging of the needle going in and out of my arm, the scent of the cologne the guy was wearing, and the tattoos he had. He even tried to talk me out of getting a tattoo, making sure I knew that some jobs wouldn't like it, or even people. I don't regret getting it, even though people say that I will when I am older. I still look at it every single day, admiring what it means to me.