Silver Already

Somewhere around this time, wwwaaaayyyyy back in 1988, I did my first tattoo. Like all great love affairs, I had no idea what I was in for, and I was too excited to care.

Mostly, I don't think too much about how long I've been doing this. I'm too busy lifting my game to care. And those of you who've been tattooed by me know that I rarely mention all those years of experience. Between the tattooers who haven't gotten better in decades and those who will flat-out lie to your face about how long they've been doing this, I'd *much* rather have you look at samples of my work and decide that you want my art.

But twenty-five years is one of those big round numbers, the kind where it's hard to escape a bit of looking back.

It's amazing how much has changed.

When I started, we were a profession of thugs and tracers pretending to be gentle-souled artists. To be sure, there were definite exceptions. Ed Hardy was so far ahead of his time it was ridiculous, and he inspired and led so many of us into the art form we now enjoy. But by and large, it was "Stop calling me a thug or I'll stomp the shit out of you," and "Hell yeah I'm a real artist, now which design off the wall you want me to trace?"

Now, of course, it's just the opposite. We've got this enormous, gorgeous, vibrant art scene, with materials and techniques that make our only limits our own skills and imaginations. I haven't had to work with a pistol on my hip in fifteen years. It's amazing and wonderful, so of course it's only natural that a generation of tattooers who enjoy all these advantages romanticize the bad old days.

It's all good.

For me, well, like I said, I don't focus much on the past. There's so much that' s beautiful and good happening right now, and just starting to happen, that I've got my hands full. Every day I wake up excited to do the absolute BEST tattoo I possibly can, and every night I go to bed thinking about how I can make tomorrow even better.

Jack Rudy (a guy who's been one of my heroes ever since I started, and who constantly amazes me with the way he evolves and matures and just plain gets better every year) is fond of saying, "If you don't keep up, you get left back."

Check back with me in another twenty-five and see how I've done... :)