Multi.Colored—tattooed people, tattoo dreams

I’m taking a night class, catching up on stuff I wanted to learn a long time ago. It’s an elementary machine shop class, and I usually get partnered with a man who’s about my age, who reminds me a lot of the character “Monk.”

Besides wanting to jump in and do everything for me, he apparently gets the heebie-jeebies looking at some of the other students in the class who are covered with various kinds of body art. Last night in class I was chatting with a (much younger) classmate who showed up with a septum piercing for the first time (or so I thought). It was one of those big silver horseshoe shaped rings that hangs down over the upper lip. I hadn’t noticed it before, so I asked if it was something new, and the young man smiled and said no, he’d had it for years, he just usually tucked the ring up inside his nose when he was in class. We chatted about that for a bit and then he moved off to work on something.

And that’s when “Mr. Monk” told me that he thinks that the way people decorate their bodies is a sure indication of their character. The implication being that people with big nose rings are in some way deficient.

I, of course, immediately let him know that I’m a tattooed person, and that I’d chosen to have my tattoos in places that could be covered up fairly easily, mainly because other people sometimes have a problem. Alas, I think I was being far too subtle.

Are our body decorations an indication of character? Well, perhaps to the extent that we multicolored people are independent thinkers who don’t want to just settle for whatever skin we happened to be given by Mother Nature. I don’t really understand why other people have a problem with body art–but then again, I don’t understand why my father said I couldn’t get my ears pierced because it would “look cheap” either.

I have been thinking about getting a more visible tattoo, probably a bracelet. The main things that have been holding me back are the cost of good tattoo work (I don’t mind paying it, it’s just that I don’t have anything in the budget right now) and the idea that it might be a problem for a potential employer. Yes, even at my age, and after taking early retirement from my last job, I still think about some HR person catching a glimpse of a tattoo and resolving to run my application through the shredder ASAP.

We have to wear protective clothing in the shop, but only on the upper half. Soon’s the weather gets warmer I’m switching to capris so at least my Egyptian ankle will show. And “Mr. Monk” is just going to have to like it or lump it. Perhaps an averse reaction to body art is an indicator of character too!

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One of the free e-newsletters I get is from Bottom Line, purveyors of all kinds of interesting information. This one is called Daily Health News, and you can check it out here if you’re interested.

Nickel, a common culprit

Today’s newsletter dealt with the fact that allergy to nickel is becoming more and more common in the USA today. A sensitivity to nickel most often causes a raised, itchy skin rash, which can be quite severe. People can go along for years, coming in contact with nickel through their jewelry, and then all of a sudden they’ve got a rash under their treasured watch or ring or earrings like you wouldn’t believe. It can also, as I can attest, happen if you’ve got bare skin up against the inside of the snap in your jeans.

I got sensitized to nickel when I got my ears pierced for the first time 40 years ago. In those days, you just bought gold earrings of some kind and put them in while the piercings were healing and hoped for the best. My starter earrings weren’t that good. I got a crusty rash while the holes were healing (and had the unenviable task of pulling those first earrings out while the holes were only partway healed, and replacing them with other earrings that I had to sterilize myself as best I could). Forever after, I have had a reaction to nickel in anything that touches my skin for any length of time. (Clear nail polish makes a reasonable coating for earrings that you just can’t give up.)

Related metal allergens in tattoo ink

What I hadn’t known, and found most interesting, is that people with nickel sensitivity may also show a reaction to some kinds of tattoo ink. It is most common with green and blue inks, which contain chromium and cobalt. So if your watch band drives you nuts, you might have problems with your tattoos as well.

Just something to think about. We decorated people have to watch out for our health.

I’ve just summarized the article briefly, here, so if you want to read more I’d suggest checking out the Bottom Line Secrets Daily Health News web site.

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