The Thing About Living With An Artist

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The other day I found myself in a warm and full bath, fully clothed, with some milk and flour mixed in.
I am a twenty year old who sat in a bath, that was basically cake ingredients.
I felt like Cruella de Vill when she got turned into a giant cake.

This is basically because I live with an artist, and my literal dunk into confectionery was in the name of photography.

This isn't the first odd thing I have been asked to do.

The First One (Tattoos)

You see. At 17, I wanted this Irish sentence on my arm, I knew that I'd be leaving Ireland and immigrating and I wanted a piece of home with me, and the phrase itself just always spoke volumes to me. I had been mulling it over for months and I knew I wanted it. Hell, I still know I want it and I'm going to be 20 in a few months.                                                              

So when I was around 17-ish, I was watching TV with my mother when I randomly broke the silence with 'What would you think if I got a tattoo?'

She wasn't against it, which I still don't know how I feel about. I mean on one hand, you kind of expect mothers to fly off the handle and come out with things like 'I basically created your arm and you want to vandalise it?!'

But on the other hand, my father has tattoos, and my mother always said that she would like one, but never knew that to get, or where to get it.

She asked me what kinda of tattoo I was thinking about, and where I would like it, and then text my dad to ask for his opinion. He didn't mind, but he gave me two rules (one which I later broke).

1. Get it in a spot where you can hide it in the event of a job interview or a court hearing, etc.
     Reasonable. I didn't want my first tattoo to be a picture of Homer Simpson on my face, or any of those huge Chinese ones on my neck anyway. I don't want them in general either. The only way that could happen is if I ever got drunk in the likes of Magaluf.

2. Get it done by the guy that does his own tattoos.
     I broke this one. I actually got mine done in another country. I wasn't going to wait months and months to go to Ireland just for a tattoo, and I had seen the work of the person near my house, so I got her to do it.


Anyway, to cut a long story short, something also popped up, and I ended up having a different tattoo for my first experience. But I plan on getting my Irish one next.

Before you go into the studio, you may be shaking in fear. That's fine. It's your first time repeatedly being stabbed by a needle that will leave a mark on your body forever, and you have no idea how it will feel until it actually happens! There's no backing out, in your mind now. You just need to place one foot in front of the other and do it.

You will see the drawing of the tattoo before the outline is transferred onto your skin, so you can tell them if there's something you're not happy with, after all you'll be the one living with it for the rest of your life.

Then you'll be covered in disinfectant, and the process shall begin.
When I first asked someone what it felt like, I got the response of a 'burning or hot scratch'.
They weren't far off the mark, it was, or else I would call it the slightest of electrocution.  I don't want to scare you off with that comment. I think I came up with it because it was near veins and nerves, and the wire kept touching my hand, giving me the feel of vibrations,
Let's just say, it's tolerable. And if you want to stop and have a break, you're allowed to do so.

So when mine was finished, it was wrapped in cling film. Everyone I know who has gone through this, had the same thing placed on it, but I've read about other cases that bandage it. But in this scenario, I was told to leave it on for an hour, and then wash it with warm water and place some Bepanthen (also heard E45 can be used) on it.

All I remember is going into the chip shop next door and staring at it like, 'woah, I've got a tattoo. I'm an adult! I see blood! Woah!'

Killing the hours wait is fine. I just watched an episode of the Simpsons and Futurama, and it was fine. The area will be a little raw for around 3 days, just make sure DON'T SCRATCH IT! (you'll ruin the ink and need a touch up)

Apparently, they take up to six weeks to heal.

My tattoo will be a week old tomorrow, and it's already beginning to peel. It's odd, watching blue skin peel away from your arm.

When I'm out, it's covered, when I'm home its airing, and I try to apply cream whenever I can. I finally feel like an adult, buying alcohol, a nose piercing, some permanent body art, budgeting my own finances and going out on nights out.

Let my twenties begin!


All reviews and comments are welcome! Again, pictures are not mine, but obviously the anecdotes are!

Unemployment Pains

Seeing as the title of this blog is called the 'Inner Dialogue and Ramblings of an Irish Immigrant', I feel it is time to discuss the pains of actually being an immigrant. I may touch on this later, in fact I can tell you about culture clashes, home sickness, learning that Matalan does NOT sell beds, among other things. But I think I may begin with the biggy.

And that is, of course, employment.

This is something that I still lack. It's a big reason for the mass immigration of Irish citizens within the past few years, and has reached high numbers that haven't been seen since the last recession of the 1980's. I've applied to numerous jobs within Liverpool, even going across the water in search of jobs on the Wirral and I've still had no luck whatsoever. I mean, I have a little bit of experience, I now know my general surroundings and understand the trains. I'm not calling that my experience by the way, I know how to take messages and I can do hands-on work. So its a bit of a bummer that the moment I'm finally settled to work, no one will take me on. The Christmas Rush has been and gone people! I need money! Don't you need people for the New Years Sales?!

This college student is in desperate need of funds! I may not drink it all! I may actually want to get a plane home for the holidays or buy a new pair of boots because I've fucked up my Doc Martins (which I still can't figure out how I did that).  Better yet, maybe I actually want to be able to buy people presents, in YOUR shop, where I want to work! I'll take Part Time, or one day a week if that's all that I can get! I'll take anything at this stage!

When I was a kid I thought : I'm gonna grow up, get one of those fur coats like the cool girls, get a job, do exams, live in my own flat, make friends and so on. I actually thought that I'd move to Waterford city and share my flat with some girls I'd grown up with.

Now I'm grown up, forced to immigrate to England, and on my own, I have no umbrella, just broken boots. I'm not one of the cool girls, barely passed exams, unemployed and I live with my best mates family. In fact all I did was make friends. I'm not complaining, in fact it's nice having friends to complain to.

With these stories from home emerging about these water charges, it makes me want to get work even more.

They say that I don't have enough experience? Well how am I meant to get it unless you give me a chance and hire me?

At this stage, I'm looking into volunteer work, so at least that way I can say that I am trained on a cash register, and it would look good on a University Application, so in a way I'm killing two birds with one stone. So far I've gotten some part time experience at a charity shop for Meals on Wheels, which not only makes me feel like a silent protester, or invisible Samaritan, but will benefit all those involved. The women there are lovely, all older than me, but lovely all the same.

This year I will be entering into my twenties, and I hope to do so with an actual job. Hopefully entry into University and employment. It's why I immigrated after all.

I recently went back to Ireland over Christmas and saw that while parts of the country was healing, other problems have just been growing worse. While I was in Dublin trying to get to the airport, I saw a lot of homeless people outside on the footpaths in the cold.
I may write an article on this in the future, but for now it will just be an idea in my head.
I may even do a countdown of the biggest trends in 2014.

Thank you for reading this, comments are welcome below! I'd love to hear from people in the same situation

Manipulative Feminism to Beat the Cheeky Patriarchs.

Manipulative Feminism to Beat the Cheeky Patriarchs.

Firstly, welcome to the blog and my first ever post.
In case you don't know, I'm a college gal in England. I was raised in a village in the middle of nowhere and busy Liverpool has been a huge culture shock for me. While all of the girls (or most) shop in River Island or Top Shop, I revert to Primark and secondhand shops. But don't  go thinking that I'm a country bumpkin though, if anything I'm a harsh little leprechaun that swears like a sailor.
But don't worry, this information is relevent...okay maybe not the swearing bit.

Now. That's all sorted.

Today began too early for me. I had to be in Liverpool for 9am, was told I had a test first thing, and ended my 9-4 day with Math and History. On the way out of college, I had to go to the desk to collect this terms Train Pass, and in doing so I was pushed to the back of the line, by a guy and his friends.
I'm a Feminist, but I'm not a radical one. If it had been a group of girls that had done it, I'd be just as equally pissed. But when it happened, I was so angry that I wondered what I could of done to have changed the outcome of that scenario, and I reached the conclusion that if I had worn make up, smiled and perhaps even wore a dress (even though I wore one yesterday) these guys would have left me in my original space.

I was also reminded of a piece of advice my mother gave me when I was a child, when she was driving us home from a day of shopping. She had been trying to pull the car out and needed a fellow driver to let her out, in order to follow a line of cars, and it had been a male driver to let her pass, to which she jokingly said to me "When you drive, make sure to catch the eye of a nice male driver".

Perhaps, if I go against my own lazy morals, and dress up more often and put more effort into my appearance, people will be nicer towards me, or leave me be, instead of push me to the back of the queue. I've been dolled up before and had random passers-by smile (and I admit it's a confidence booster). Also, I refuse to believe that women should go against their own morals for a man, but if I were to do this, I'm in control. I'm getting something out of it, it may not be a full respect and I may be objectified, but I may feel like Marilyn Monroe. People found her to be dim-witted and stupid, yet she was a certified genius that always read, and rarely read fiction at that. She revolutionized feminism in film (pushing the boundaries when it came to wearing clothes on screen) and was also a huge supporter of equal rights.



The only thing that holds me back, is the fact that I'm lazy and would have to wake up at the crack of dawn to apply cheap make up to my face in order to manipulate people, be they women or cheaky men who think they can do what they want, like cheat and skip queues.

I don't want to be one of the girls that starve themselves to pay for Top Shop designer clothes and gets spots because my pores become clogged with make up. I like cheap, outdated, vintage clothing and I like stuffing my face, and even though I may change and put more effort into my appearance and look in the mirror and see myself as being a bit heavy in places, the rest of me will never change. I will forever be the blogging, procrastinating slob that I've always been. After all, it's get my eyebrows done or read fanfiction. And I think we both know which one will win out at this stage.

And the best part, these strangers don't even know they've been mentioned in a blog....plus I didn't miss my train.

xx

I do not own photographers used in this post and all credit and copyright rights goes towards respected photographers and companies.