Up and Coming Weekly is a weekly publication in Fayetteville, NC and Fort Bragg, NC area offering local news, views, arts, entertainment and community event and business information.
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THIS WEEK WITH MARGARET by MARGARET DICKSON "For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction." Sir Isaac Newton, 1642-1727 One of the best parts about writing a column for Up and Coming Weekly is hearing what you think about what I think. Sometimes I get responses to particular columns, and sometimes I do not. By far, the most comments come from columns that strike a personal chord with readers, including one about a young friend of mine who had a baby at 17 with her high school honey. Another in 2005 generated an avalanche, literarily speaking, addressed why a woman about my age would have a vivid yellow Tweety Bird tattooed on her ankle and ascending her calf. Readers told me in no uncertain terms that they got their tats to commemorate various life experiences — a romance, a birth, a death, a celebration, a milestone, a religious belief, an achievement. Sometimes, they are a reminder of hard partying that the wearer remembers only hazily. Most, but not all, of my correspondents, were not sorry, although several confessed to keeping their body art covered in some situations, like work and visiting the in-laws. I know it is a generational issue akin to my parents not understanding why teenaged Margaret wanted to pierce her ears. I also remember that I told my friends and the Precious Jewels that I had sworn off writing about this, but I just cannot get accustomed to all the tattoos passing colorfully by me every day in stores, in theaters, in restaurants and other places I frequent in my daily routine. Nevertheless … here goes. A recent story in the News and Observer, a he displayed the evidence for TV cameras. What is more, he is taking his two older children along with him so they can see the painful laser removal procedure, which he describes as "like someone fl icking hot bacon grease on you over and over again." Dr. Cox also recently treated a nurse who told her, "I've got a tramp stamp. I hate it." For the 2005 column, I visited a Fayetteville tattoo establishment and watched an already tattooed soldier suffering through eight hours or so of a tattoo gun inking a colorful dragon, a design chosen by his 4-year-old son, around his calf. It was going to cost about $1,000. When I asked whether it was painful, he assured me that he would be "self-medicating" soon. Whatever discomfort the soldier felt, however, apparently pales compared to how removal feels. There are topical creams and ointments, often containing acid and accompanied by serious warnings. Accurate assessments of such products and their results are hard to come by. More effective and decidedly more expensive are medical treatments. A colorful tattoo done by a professional, whose ink generally goes deeper into the skin than that of an amateur, requires multiple laser treatments. Some people choose the surgical option, simple excision and/or skin grafts. Any of these procedures can run into the thousands of dollars, little if any of which is covered by insurance. Laser tattoo removal is a painful and costly way to remove tattoos. Raleigh newspaper, suggests that buyer's remorse has set in, at least for some. The reporter, Josh Shaffer, put it this way. "After two decades of widespread tattooing, an era that saw librarians getting butterfl ies scratched onto their shoulders and lawyers wearing rings of barbed wire under their button-down shirts, the era of second thoughts has arrived." Shaffer interviewed medical professionals in Raleigh and Chapel Hill who say their tattoo removal business has picked up. Dr. Sue Ellen Cox, a Raleigh physician, began removing tattoos 16 years ago. Early on, most of her patients were former gang members whose faces bore the symbols of their various affi liations. Many of them were referred by police, and she treated them without charge. More often today, her patients are people like the man who did not want their grandchildren to see permanent reminders of long-ago loves or of experiences best left in the past. Actor Mark Wahlberg falls into this category. He told viewers of both the David Letterman and Today shows in January that he is having all of his tattoos born of a rebellious youth removed, and The bottom line seems to be this: Tattooing is an ancient practice, with the evidence of human beings' desire to decorate our bodies found on mummies thousands of years old. So is the desire to get rid of tattoos, and history records that ancient Romans actually sanded them away. The American Academy of Dermatology says that about one quarter of Americans between 18 and 50 now sport tattoos. That is a lot of people, and I suspect that some of them would like to return to the blank canvas of their birthday suits. Seven years after my fi rst column on tattoos, I would love to know what you think now. Do you have one — or two or more? Why did you decide to get tattooed? Do you love or hate it (or the)? Would you do it again? What do they mean to you? Let me hear from you, and I will share your stories. MARGARET DICKSON, Columnist. Up & Coming Weekly. COMMENTS? Editor@upandcomingweekly.com. Ytrvurvvbvuvurru vvyryrvx 484-6200 www.upandcomingweekly.com H Banquet rooms available up to 100 guests 6 UCW MARCH 14-20, 2012 apy p 484-0261 1304 Morganton Rd. Mon-Sat: 6am-10pm Sun: 7am-3pm Serving Fayetteville Over 50 Years! WWW.UPANDCOMINGWEEKLY.COM THIS WEEK WITH MARGARET Buyer's Remorse