Walking through the halls, not everyone can see the ink that may be tatted on the skin of others. Teachers and students in the school have tattoos, and even more have thoughts of getting one.
It can often be hard to tell when one may have chosen to permanently put art on their skin and almost impossible to know why.
“I’ve wanted this since I was six,” said Tanner Jones when talking about his first tattoo. Jones went into Arch Rivals on Sept 1, a week after turning 18, to get a fish hook tattooed onto the back of his hand. He decided on the fish hook because he simply loves to fish, but the day he went to get the ink it was a total impulse decision; it was not planned in any way. Cyrus Kulp, a close friend of Jones, said, “That tattoo matches Tanner’s personality so much, have you met him?”
Abby Meyers, senior at PVHS, turned 18 at the beginning of this school year. She’s known for a while now that she wanted to get a tattoo once she was of age. In Iowa, you can’t get a tattoo before you’re 18, with or without a parent. It’s against the law. Meyers never even thought about going out of state, somewhere like Missouri, where she could have gotten a tattoo before she turned 18 with a parent’s permission. Now she is simply waiting for the right time to come.
Meyers wants a rose to be her first tattoo because it simply resembles the thought of love. She’s someone who is a fan of tattoos, she thinks it makes a person more attractive even though statistics say 60 percent of people lose attractiveness when tattoos are visible. She said, “I’m getting the rose behind my ear, not because I care if people see it but because only the people I’m close to will know it’s there.”
Most people tend to get their first tattoo before the age of forty. 39 percent of people are 18 or younger when they choose to get their first tattoo. Another 42 percent are between the ages of 19-29. Ink has become a popular way for adults, and now commonly teenagers, to express themselves however they choose.
Sometimes there’s meaning behind the ink and other times it’s just a way for people to decorate themselves with drawings or words they love.
