THROWBACK THURSDAY: My Ink

If you saw me in the street, a slightly chubby pasty-faced square wearing a comic book-themed t-shirt and shorts, you probably wouldn't imagine that I was the sort of person to have a tattoo.

That said, these days they're a lot more commonplace than when I was growing up.

I remember I was watching a documentary on TV, with a work colleague (a fellow journalist), about tattooing, and I asked her if she'd ever considered getting one. Instead of answering, she simply rolled up her sleeve and showed me her tattoo. I can't remember what it was.

What I do remember was thinking that maybe I should get one then. I just had no idea of what.

Let's be clear, it wasn't Hunter S Thompson's fault that I got a tattoo, but he certainly influenced my choice of design.

It so happened, once I decided to get a tattoo, that I'd just read one of Hunter's collections of articles (it was either The Great Shark Hunt or Generation Of Swine) and in it was a piece about how, one day when he had nothing to write about, he convinced his assistant to get a tattoo of a black jaguar so he could write about that. I'm sure alcohol was probably involved as well.

I had no other idea, at the time, about what to get tattooed on my left arm and so went with a black jaguar as well.

Once I was in the tattoo parlour, in the chair, it turned out to be a lot less painful than I'd been expecting (from the moment the tattooist told me to relax), but that said - given my needle-phobia that has developed since my extended stay in hospital - I doubt I'll get another any time soon.

This all happened in the early '90s and I managed to keep my tat a secret from my parents until I was hospitalised ten years ago. At that point it wasn't a high priority to still keep it covered over in their presence.

And, I suppose given the circumstance of their discovery that their beloved son had permanently marked his body with an image of a black cat, they took it very well. All things considered!

I don't regret getting tattooed for an instant, even if it doesn't have any deep significance. It's part of me now. It was something I wanted to do at the time, I did it, and now it's done.

I certainly won't be applying to appear on Tattoo Fixers.