______________________________________________________________________________________________
I came from a very conservative town in Minnesota. We didn’t have tattoos there. I moved to El Paso and worked until I became disabled. I was around 53 years old. Because of my disability I could only sit in a chair. At the time, a friend asked me to find him a picture of a dragon on the Internet so he could get a tattoo. When I found the picture we talked about him getting the tattoo and he said, “I know you want one too. I will pay for it.” The Pandora’s box was opened and that was when I got my dragon on the back of my right shoulder.
Two weeks later, I went to get the other shoulder balanced out with another dragon. Eddie (McQuestion, from early Fleshtones) and I discussed a back piece and he started doing the outlines for it. Having the input to create the art that was going to go on my body and then enduring the process and seeing the outcome. I was hooked after that. The back piece was 84 hours over the course of a year. During that time I would get other artists to start tattooing other parts of my body. My wife had passed away and I had Robert Chavira tattoo me a rose for her that he drew from an actual rose that was at her funeral service. My left leg started getting inked and I was starting to think about getting my whole body done. I was meeting other artists and seeing their work and it slowly was becoming that my whole body was being covered. I got my sleeves done by Jay Chavira. I was and still am into dragon lore and I got my left arm sleeve done first with many dragons. There are so many dragons on both arms that I do not honestly know how many there are. I originally wanted the sleeve to end at the wrist but when it crossed over my wrist I knew there was no turning back now. A shirt sleeve would not be able to hide my sleeved arm and I was truly marked for life. It was who I was. I now wanted the full body suit and my friends did not believe I would do it, but I am a Capricorn and I was more determined to do it now.
My job was my life and it was my identity, it was who I was. I thought I lost everything because of my injury. Tattooing gave me my life back. I am now 64, and in the past 11 years, it has made me the person who I wanted to be. It opened my mind to not being narrow-minded. I became the extreme person that I judged before. Tattooing has given me friendships and experiences I never dreamed I would have. It has given me life and it has showed me how to live.
PHOTOS: MEGANLEIGH WARD (C) 2011
Había tanta costumbre entre nuestras rutinas y nos sentimos dueños del tiempo que tuvimos que…
Sólo vas a tener que darme dos segundos en lo que dejo las bolsas de…
egendary turntable wizard and producer DJ Scratch is headed to El Paso as part of…