Your First Tattoo Story

[Lochlan]

The who, what, where, when, and why of your first tattoo with a picture pls?!?

Edited September 8, 2010 by Lochlan

[Gia Dobson]

I was 16, at a party, got tattooed sitting at the kitchen table by some random that carried around all his shit in an old doctors bag. God only knows that last time any of it was cleaned and where the needles came from or how many times they had been used. I don't recall anything about gloves or any kind of sanitation. Let's just say this was in the top 5 most stupid things Ive ever done in my life and I am thankful every day that I do not have Hep C or HIV. Oh the tattoo... a small black widow spider on my chest... which has long since been covered up with a hibiscus flower. Feels like I dodged a bullet.

[Scott Sylvia]

i was 14 rode my bmx bike to aaron cains house hung over, sat on a couch in his bed room and held onto a plastic cap that covered the disposable razor full of ink as he sort of gave me a lap dance and tattooed a pig head with sunglasses and a rose in his mouth on my chest with a jail house machine guitar string and all, fuckin thing was like a puffy sticker for years. didnt stop me now look at me tattooed lace gloves and all.haha

[mario desa]

nice. mine's not as cool! 1995, 20 yrs old. a band of X's around my forearm at a skinhead house in milwaukee! i took the bus there with my little brother, on the way home we were stoked! i'd never even seen a tattoo machine before that.

[calbee]

1990 in Ohio. I was living with a friend in Kent who had gotten a few pieces so I went with him to a shop called G&G. I had a copy of a Leo Zulueta image that had been a skateboard graphic so I decided to get that... I walked into the shop with the image the exact size I wanted which in hindsight was huge, it's about a foot long or so and told the tattooer what I wanted and where I wanted it placed and he shot me a look like yeah right guy you're not sit for this. So he made the stencil and we put it on and he kept trying to get me to just get the outline, but I wanted it filled in. So after about two hours of just the back of my head and my heels on the table I walked out with a nice big tribal chest piece... Soon to be a nice big black panther cover up, haha. The best part was all the other tattooers coming back looking in on us completely surprised I was really sitting for it.

[Kevin Campbell]

My first tattoo was done by Cody Miller in 1998 when I turned 18, it was a little Frank Lee skull on my leg. I think it was like his 6th tattoo or something. I still work at the shop he did it at. Ha.

[MsRad]

my first tattoo was done by Chris Conn in early 2005. i was 19, had been on his waiting list for a few months, and knew what elements i wanted. i basically went in and told him that i wanted a chest piece and that it needed to incorporate anchors, irises, and a sacred heart. i came back in a week (maybe two, i can't remember exactly) and he had drawn out the design perfectly. he asked me if i was sure that i wanted it on my chest, and i assured him i'd be ok and that i wanted it on my chest because it was a tattoo about my parents, yada yada yada. anyways, the flames ended up being too high, and we both joked how we didn't think it would be a good idea for me to have a neck tattoo as my first one, so we modified them by parting them down the center so they now go out to the sides right below the center of my collar bone, and i still love that idea/decision. took 3 sessions, 2 4 hour, one 2 hour, and it's still, sincerely, one of the least painful tattoo experiences i've had to this day. i wish i had gotten more work done, but by the time i could afford another piece (i was in college at the time), i had gone to Ireland for study abroad and came back to find out that Chris had retired. the only way i could afford that tattoo was by saving change for 3 years, plus tips from working at a peet's, an ice cream shop, and the money i received from xmas/birthdays.

[Lochlan]

Damn those are some rich stories of all your first tattoos, thanks for bringing them here! Anyone got pictures? Yes Scott I know yours is covered as I already tried to get you to show it to me. Calbee, can we see a before and after as you are getting ready to get some cover up in the tattoo removal or cover up thread? Thanks everyone for continuing to contribute rich content.

[shaneenholm]

12 years old...pine street..no 3rd street group home...I was the youngest kid in there...first night at the dinner table i saw aheart on Alvin romeros arm and was all' what is that??????!!!!!" first time i had ever saw one ....

so they say of course "a tattoo"...and that night they showed me how to do it...handpick em.....so i did an aries symbol on my hand...and then went hogwild...i woke up the next morning and the grouphome parents were named Jan and jon...when they saw them i was afraid i would get in deep shit but jon just laughed and laughed and said'well shane...now you cannot be a spy...." and i was so young that i actually was bummed for a minute thinking..."shit he's right...now i cannot be a spy.... so much for that as a career...."

there is a reason people should get some life experience under their belt before they get tattooed....

When Scott sterling worked at sailor moses shop in biloxi Miss. their was a father and son that used to come in there and moses would tattoo the dad and then do the same tattoo smaller on the kid..and the kid was 9 years old...9YEARS OLD !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

scott worked there i figure from like 85 or 86 until 89ish....guessing....so that kid "all growed up" is about 30..i would love to see those tattoos now.....

[Dani Oakley]

I was freshly 18 (had been waiting years!) and had it all planned out to get some stupid black dragons on my hips (think similar to Sick of it All dragons). Then my best friend came to visit me and one night after we sobered up from a 24hr good time bender, we decided to go get matching tattoos. We went to the only shop we could find in the phone book who was open and taking walk-in's at 10pm. It was some half-ass (but clean) street shop by ASU. We picked some flash out of a book, the Irish "self" rune, had them add some clouds behind it and agreed. I went first and totally almost fell alseep getting my sternum tattooed. I was in happy land knowing that this was in fact everything I'd been waiting for! What both of us failed to realize when choosing the "center of our being" location was that it was also right in our tits and thus would become the easiest way for cheesey ass dudes to talk to our chests about our chests at bars for the rest of our lives.

Here is a crappy old photo of us the next day showing off...and then both of us looking at mine (left) compared to hers and realizing that me having gone first meant my tattoo wasn't as clean as hers. *it's since been touched up* I don't regret a thing!

p.s. luckily, I never did get the tribal dragons.

[Erica]

My mom is a biker chick who has had hand tattoos since the day i was born, so when I wanted to get tattooed at 15 she called up her old friend named "Tattoo Pete" . We went to his house for the appointment, he smoked some pot and got started on my tribal sun that we put on my shoulder. I wanted my astrological sign placed in the middle of the sun-- he did it upside down (im a leo, it looked like the letter U instead of N) but he smoked some more pot and and said "eh, we can fix that" and he did.

I had that one covered up, but i kept the dragon he gave me a year later. Its awful, but i kind of love it anyhow.

[hambone]

day after i turned 18..1995..parents were outta town for a few days..i went to the only shop i new of in my area...i want to say it was called artistic impressions, dude named paul hayden.puled up there was a badass nova parked out front..walked into the "waiting room" which had a pool table, a couple of couches, a bunch of ashtrays, and hardly any lights on...all i heard from the other room was.."what the fuck you want!" i was a young, naive, good little church boy at the time(kinda..haha)..man i was scared shitless..ended up getting "forgiven" on my backl in old english..thought it was sooo big and badass..hahaha..it was like 1 1/2 inches tall by maybe 6 long...sinc has been covered up by my backpiece of a huge severed samurai head...

[Lochlan]

Hambone, nice Samurai back piece. Who did it and how long ago?

Erica, thanks for sharing what could of been an "oops" but nothing a little creativity couldn't fix, haha.

[BoMcConaghie]

small eagle on my ankle in my friends apartment at a "tattoo party". I was 14. Never looked back.

[Lochlan]

Good afternoon everyone thought I would post this link on how to upload photos Steve wrote incase you wish to include them in your post. Thanks for sharing and keep the tattoo stories and tattoo pictures coming!

http://www.lastsparrowtattoo.com/tattooforum/threads/70-How-to-upload-attach-images-to-your-posts

[Paulski]

It was 99 or 2000, I was 19 or 20 at the time. I got a graffiti piece that spelled out my graffiti name on my upper back, shoulder to shoulder, by a friend in his house. glad i never got it colored in. its still holding up good, kinda ruined good back piece estate, haha. have no regrets.

[hambone]

a buddy i used to work with..chris spriggs...http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1686644565..took about 15 hours...about 3 years ago i think...maybe 4...

[gougetheeyes]

Oh man. 2001, just turned 18. (Yeah I'm a young dude.) Went to this shop in MD, can't remember the name but it was on Rt. 1 a couple blocks down from Great Southern. Picked out bluebirds for my chest, a design that was from the dude's own sheet, pretty goofy and new-schooly, I didn't know shit about shit. He was a white dude with dreads and he let me pick out the music so I was even more stoked. We put on the Deftones' Adrenaline album. He smoked as he tattooed me and every few minutes told me stop moving. Didn't tell me anything about aftercare, but the "regulars" in the parking lot just told me to buy plain chapstick so I used that and freaked out because half my chest turned purple and yellow, bruised to shit. They're still there. Good ol' bluebirds..

PS his shop burned down about a month later.

[Jake]

a buddy i used to work with..chris spriggs...http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1686644565..took about 15 hours...about 3 years ago i think...maybe 4...

link didn't work for me...

[Mr. Frog]

Ha. My First WAS a tribal dragon on my leg. I was about 18 and the legal age was still 21 in Illinois. I looked really young for my age back then, but I was wearing a Flight Jacket and Doc Martens, so they must've figured I wasn't gonna get the shop in trouble. It was in the old location of The Tattoo Factory, and the guy who did it still works there. It's 16 yrs old, still solid black though.

[Golfballin43]

Got a fucking tribal with my last name not the worst thing but three weeks later it looked small on my arm so got a huge tribal. Justified it cuz I was the only guy to carryout the family name but now I just look at as m a half sleeve I could have beautiful artwork laying. Im not the macho asshole guy that needs a tribal war tattoo

[Tight-Lines]

Im not sure how I never posted in this thread.

Anyways, I was 17 and working at Applebee's when I met Ralph. He was a ex con Sureno who started doing tattoos on the side for some extra cash. Anyways, I decided to hit him up for a quick piece on my ankles. I have "Rise" on one ankle and "Above" on another. The fonts are shitty, the rise is higher than the above, and the E in rise looks like a C with a dick in the middle.

Dont get tattooed by cooks from Applebee's.

[hogg]

I will wait for you to post pics, but I won't wait forever. Lochlan beat me to the BANPUNCH on JGoss the kitchen--I mean living room--magician, so don't test me.

[Scott R]

i got the name of our street with guitar string and indian ink back in 91. I followed that beaut up with more horrible homemade script jobs like initials and nickname then in comparison a half decent cross and memorial. I am super smart so I covered it all with tribal once I got to college in 94 in some guys kitchen but atleast he had a tatty gun!

[justcallmematt]

Mom did the kanji for Mom on my sternum when I was 17.