Body Art

This sign is on the side wall of a Tattoo parlour situated incongruously in the middle of a douce group of shops in leafy Newington.
Tattoos seem to be in fashion at the moment with the young and not so young, but can be a bit of a contraversial adornment to people like his Lordship and others of more extreme years.
I'm sure they were always popular though with the sea going fraternity. My grandfather was a merchant seaman in his late teens and had some floral tattooing done on his arms. In later years as a man of propriety and decorum, this youthful body artwork came back to haunt him. I can remember as a very small child sitting on his knee and trying to explore the pretty colours beyond his shirt cuff. I never did manage to see more than the basket that contained the flowers as he always pulled down his sleeve very promptly, embarrassment etched on his face.

As far as I know it is only my youngest daughter who has succumbed to the tattooist. She came back from a student holiday in the USA with some chinese lettering embossed on the small of her back. She told me it meant some thing quite innocuous, but how can she tell? It may very well say 'Long live the Hezbollah' for all she knows!
I have to be grateful that she didn't return with 'Love' and 'Hate' crudely tattooed on her fingers.

I do wonder though how the butterflies and flowers etc tattoed on peoples bodies will look when the recipients are old and wrinkly. In their care homes will the staff be amused at these symbols that may well define an era?

This shop also does body piercing, which his Lordship finds even more puzzling, but I'll leave that phenomenon to another day.