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ellus986 · 5 years

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Always knew you / chapter seventeen

Joe Mazzello x reader

Warning: swearing, unprotected sex (use condoms kiddos, if you don’t wanna have kiddos)

Comment: Y/N is corrently 22, while Joe is 36.

Summary: you knew Joe all of your life, and as best friends you two always find the way back to each other.

You landed in Bali in the early hours of the day, but even at that time it was boiling hot compered to the freezy plane. You get down the yankees sweater as soon as possible as you step outside of the airport to get into your transfer car, what will take you to your first private villa you booked.

The Island was chaotic and yet beautiful from the car you are sitting in with your husband. Your husband, will you be ever get used to that?

“What is on your mind, wife?” You can hear how proud he is to call you his wife.

“Thinking about how am I going to get used to calling you my husband!” You giggle.

“Is it that bad?” He chuckles into your neck.

“No, the oposite, it is the best thing in my life!” You smooth your hand in his messy hair. “I love to say it next to daddy!”

You feel his hand slowly rubbing your belly. “I love both, mommy!” He wishpers into your ear.

“Can you believe?” You moan into his hair.

“That you made my life better than I ever imagined?” He cups your face and puts kisses all over it.

“You speak Mr. Perfect?” You felt your heart racing in your body already.

“Me, I just stole from your youth, you are the one who decided to just let her life go down the sink, and lift me up!” He chuckles, but you can see in his brown eyes he is serious.

“Hey! I did not let my life go down! It’s just starting to be fun... and you don’t need my youth!” You poke your forefinger into his chest.

“Are you not afaird for even a second that you won’t live everything you wanted before starting a family?” He asks, and you don’t know where to put this behavior.

“Are you?” You ask back, even you are not sure you want to hear the answer.

“No, never, I want nothing more than starting a family...” he admits, and you look into the deep hazel eyes.

“As do I!” You cut in. His eyebrows are raising high so you continue. “I grow up next to you old man! I kinda always were a little bit ahead of my age...” you look at him in disbelief as he still can’t believe you, or atleast his face tells you that. “I told you when I was three and you were sixteen that I’m going to marry you. Don’t you think I have been dreaming about it all of my life? I like to get waisted sometimes, but man to wake up next to you is something I like way better, and I love the thought of that I have your child under my heart. I would never ever change this to be a young and wild girl!” You roll your eyes.

“Are you really sure?” He asks, and you roll your eyes again.

“Not like I could just walk away...” you look at your hand with the ring on it, while you are rubbing your still inseeable bump. “But yes I’m sure I want you to be my husband and I want to be the mother of our children.” You smile at him.

“I want nothing more and nothing less!” Comes from him, while you are spellbound by his deep, dark eyes.

“Silly, anything else is not an option!” You giggle as you turn back in your seat and put your head on his shoulder as he does the same. “You can’t get rid of me anymore“

“That’s the spirit!” He puts his hand on your belly, and you almost instantly fell asleep.

__________________________________________

You are sitting on front of the giant window on the bed and look at the rainy forest, and the rise lands under you. Joe was still sleeping next to you, but you are already awake thanks to the morning sickness.

He turns to you and hugs your leg in his sleep. You can’t help it, your face is just an enormous smile, as you start to play with his messy, redish brown hair. His breath is softly slicks on your leg, and you can’t imagine better place to be. “Oh little one, you choosed the best daddy ever!” You rub your belly slowly, and feel how the love just gets trought all of your inches.

The first one week of your honeymoon showed you have deep you can love someone. When you married Joe you thought you knew everything, you knew how you can love him, and how he can love you, but you were wrong. Your love gets deeper and deeper everyday, it shivers in your body every minute more and more. You see how different is the love in his eyes, how much more he fell in love with you. You never thought you could fall more, but now you know there is no limit in this, you will just fall for all of your life. How could you not, if he was an ecxelent gentleman, a caring dad, a loving husband. You adored him, as you adored your child. You felt everyday happier, and more loved.

You played with his hair for more than an hour before he started to wake up. “Good morning handsome!” You wishper.

“Good morning beautiful!” He groans into your leg. “You couldn’t sleep?”

“Yeah, the dinner is out!” You laugh. You always were afaird to speak about vomiting so casual, without the frear of the one you talk to will not likeing you for it. It wasn’t the case with your husband, you could speak about how you vomited all night and he would look at you with the same love in his eyes, before he kisses your still bad tasting lips. He did it several time by now.

“Poor wife!” He grabs you and pulls you to make you more lied down. He starts to kiss your belly, before the words fall out of his mouth. “Sweet child o’mine!” You start to giggle, but he haven’t finished yet. “Please don’t make your mother so sick, I want to see her happy!”

“I’m happy!” You shout the answer so quick.

“Yeah? You are?” He looks up at you with a chalenging face.

“Yes, I am!” You nod with a big smirk on your face. “I’m with the two most important people in the world right now, sleeping or listening to the rain, while you are sleeping on my legs who cares? To be fair the second sounds better!”

“You love to be a stalker! I knew it!” He chuckles and you still staned by his humor.

“Not as much as you! Mr. ‘Cause he is great!” You giggle.

“You stalker!” He tickles you.

“I haven’t stalked you! Seen you commenting ‘cause he is great! I was curious where did you commented that...” you laugh. “Turned out you stalk your stalkers!”

“That is not true!” He tries to not chuckle. “I was tagged on that picture!” He says it like a royal, chins up, eyes never on you, before he grabs you into a laughing tickling battle.

“Okay,okay I give up!” You giggle hands in air.

“You give up?” He asks still tickling you.

“Yes, Yes, Yes please stop!” You suffer under his hands.

_______________________________________

You are sitting in a restaurant with your husband. The sun was almost fully covered by the ocean, you are just sitting next to. Your hand is in his hand, while he is smoking on his - to be specific Eugune’s - pipe. He only got it out twice in the last two week, and you find it sexy in a way. “You know you should stop with this habbit!” You giggle.

“What can I do, if it makes you horny?” He winks at you.

“Think about your child!” You wink back.

“Okay, thank you, you ruined it!” He puts it down.

“Sorry!” You lean over the table and kiss him.

“You will always get out the dad card if I do something stupid?” He asks so disgusted, you can’t keep the laughter back.

“Yes!” You smooth his auburn hair out of his face.

“That is no fair!” He looks like a child now, who’s toy was taken.

“Welcome to the adult life!” You can’t stop laughing.

“I’m an adult for a long time now!” He crosses his hand infront of his chest.

“Yeah, I can see!” You crack up more laughing.

“Can we concentrate on our dinner?” He asks hufish.

“Yes, ofcourse!” You try to end your laughing.

Joe is just a little kid all way while you eat. He sulks all night, giving you the mad eyes, or just not even looking at you. You giggle on him more than he is okay with it, but you can’t help it.

After he payed, you get up and hold your hand out for him to take it. He is hesitating just to play with you, but eventually holds your hand. You walk on the street full of drunk teenagers, and maybe some of your age.

“You see? You miss out the drunk nights like their!” He wishpers.

“You have fomo again, I’m not good enough for you anymore?” You giggle. He pinches your jaw suddenly and kisses you deep, and violent. You can feel how he is getting hard.

“Ofcourse you’re enough for me!” He holds you close cupping your face, so noone can see how much he is effected by his own move, but those hazel eyes are telling you everything.

“I don’t need the pipe to be...” you can’t end your sentence as he kisses you again. It is wild, hot and steamy.

Some girls are walking by and one of them slaps on your ass. “Get him girl!” She yells as they walk away, and you giggle into Joe’s mouth.

“You heard her!” He bits your bottom lip.

“Oh yeah I did!” You grab his hand and walk with him.

“Oohm, the hotel is in the another direction!” Cough Joe.

“Yeah, I know!” You nod, as you finally find what you were looking for. A dark alley. “I won’t wait until that!” You walk him into the dark.

“Wait what? But anyone can see...” he can’t end it, as you throw you panties in his face. You see as his eyebrows are raising as he shakes he head and follows you farer from the street.

“This is the fun, I want to do before having kids!” You giggle into his neck as you unbutton his pants. “I told you it is better to be underwearless!” You let his hard cock out of his jeans. You get on your knees and taste him, while you eye fuck him.

“Are you sure?” He stutters, before you nod with his dick in your mouth. It doesn’t take long before he puts his hand on your nape and moans. You groan as you feel him moving trowards your lips, while your hand is helping you out, as you can’t take all of his lenght in.

You know he is close, but you want to feel him inside you. Just when you part your lips from his member he lifts you up, and gets on his knees, puts his head under your dress. You giggle what real quick turns into a moan. He can work wonders with his mouth, don’t speak about how he knows to move his nose just in right position, just in the right time.

You feel empty as he gets up. “Please!” You moan.

“Needy woman!” He whispers into your ear as he lifts you up with one hand, and help his prick into you with the other, as you put your legs around his waist. You are sure people can hear the sound of the banging skin even from the street, but you don’t care. You tense as he trust himself into you completly. “Sorry...sorry” he is about to pull himself out.

“Don’t... I just need some second to get used to...” you kiss him.

“Are you sure?” He moans into your mouth.

“Yes!” You bounce on him, and he shivers.

“If you do this one more time I can’t control myself!” He groans as his fingers are carved into your bottom, but you move again. “Please! I don’t wanna hurt you!”

“Fuck me Joe!” You wishper into his ear, you don’t need to say it twice he grabs your ass even harder and he pumps in you so fast, you can’t remember anything else, just his name. “Joe!” You bit his shoulder to not scream as you cum, around his thick cock.

“Y/N!” He moans into your neck, as he spreds your wall with his seed.

To be continued...

My sweet perms:

@spacedust1124719 @simply-sams-things

Story tags:

@mrsmazzello

#joe mazzello #joe mazzello x you #joe mazzello x y/n #joe mazzello fan fic #joe mazzello x reader #joe mazzello fan fiction #joseph francis mazzello iii #joseph mazzello #bohemian rhapsody fan fic #bohrap fanfic #bohrap fanfiction

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sierrabinondo · 5 years

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woodland creatures - day 4 (orlando pt. 2)

was i excited to be on tour? yes. was i also super nervous about going on tour before leaving? also yes.

was i excited to go to disney springs? Y E S. was it the one thing i knew i could look forward to even if i sucked at every fucking show???

B I G�� Y E S.

my poor bandmates. i said the night before, “hey, i just realized, we never actually really discussed going to disney springs.” and they were like, “yeah.”

but! we went anyway!!! bless their hearts!!!

the morning after staying up and partying was rough. i had the NASTIEST hangover. my headache was so severe that i couldn’t even fall back asleep following 5 hours of rest. i popped some advil and tried to get a couple more hours in but it was impossible, so i just got up and showered. the guys brought back panera for lunch, and then once everyone was ready we were off to disney springs. i could tell everyone was worried it was gonna be lame, i felt it in the air lmao. i was also worried i was leading them to a miserable afternoon in the hot florida weather. but i figured if they hated it we could always leave.

we pull up to disney springs and there is some semblance of what i remembered from the last time i was there but also a lot that i DID NOT recognize. the parking garages were definitely new. they had sensors over each parking spot that could indicate whether or not a car was in the spot, and it would update an LED screen outside the entrance with how many spots were available on each floor. i thought that was really cool. there were gardens on the sides of the garages too. we then go up some stairs and down an escalator to get in, and hooooly shit i was blown away. there was a brand new area that had a fountain and all of the shops looked reminiscent of spanish architecture. it was so beautiful.

we got group pictures in front of the fountain, and then i decided to get a happy birthday pin from guest relations lmfao. i wanted to see if i could get any free shit by just waltzing around with a birthday pin on. i was unsuccessful but i had never been in or near disney on my birthday anyways so i just rolled with it. we started to the right and went to world of disney, marketplace co-op, the lego store and the pin trading shop.

i was completely overwhelmed by how big all of the stores were. there was so much cool shit. i really thought i would have an easy time abstaining from spending money, since my sister was literally just there and got me the one thing i wanted, but i did NOT. at world of disney i bought ANOTHER pair of minnie ears, the rose gold sparkly ones lmfao. not usually my style, but there weren’t any others i was crazy about. joe got a shirt and ryan bought some stuff for his girlfriend christina. i wanted clothes but i decided to wait to see if there might be better merchandise elsewhere.

we moved on to marketplace co-op and i immediately found a disney world long sleeve shirt i loved so i grabbed that. i alsoooo balled out and got a print of the most beautiful mulan painting i have ever seen. it was a depiction of one of my favorite parts in the movie, when she is singing reflection and chops off her fuckin hair, but in the garden instead of the shrine. that movie means very very much to me as an asian american!!! besides that i got emperor’s new groove patches later on in the afternoon and that was all i spent my money on. $138 later. yeesh.

my friends eton and jeri who came to the show the night before wanted to meet up for food and drinks, so i walked over to frontera cucina. i thought maybe my bandmates might join us but they weren’t hungry and it was more of a sit down place, so we parted ways for an hour. i hadn’t seen eton and jeri since they moved down to orlando in january, holy shit. it was so good to hang out with them. we caught up and enjoyed some really good lunch. i ordered a gin and tonic that had a whole ass cucumber peel wrapped around the glass and pork belly tacos. i bugged out bad because eton wouldn’t let me pay nor could i get his venmo from jeremiah to cover my portion. it was so sweet of them to treat me. i met them through jeremiah, i always tell him how much i love his friends and how they’ve become my friends the more we all hang out together. it sucks our time was so damn brief but i’m just glad i got to see them.

after late lunch i met back up with everyone and we walked around a little longer, but i mistakenly let us stay a little later and lost track of time. it was just about time to start heading over to hail the sun. i felt really bad because people mentioned wanting to go swimming or take a nap and i effectively robbed everyone of any allotted leisure activity time by wanting to gallavant around more. i was definitely just as wiped as everyone, but i hadn’t been back to disney in forever. we hurried back to the van and drove back to kissimmee.

pulses. had been grilling and chillin at the airbnb all day, so they were ready for the gig when we got back. we got back just in time to leave when they did, like 15 minutes before. we both hopped in our respective vehicles and we were off. they always dropped snails in the tour chat and called us with snails ahead because we were slow with the van lmfao but it’s not MY FAULT the shit is SO HUGE damnit. i drove the van to the gig with josef, jaime and kris while ryan and santino stayed home.

it’s interesting to go to a show in another state, it does feel pretty weird to go somewhere unfamiliar, but it really does feel the same as attending a show at home. people really are pretty much the same everywhere else, just different geographical locations and climates. the gig was really good but the venue was SO SMALL. too small. i like the soundbar but i might like it better if you didn’t have to wade your way through a crowd of swamp ass to get to the bathrooms alllll the way on the other side of the venue opposite of the entrance. plus, it got so packed that it was really difficult to be near the stage, let alone inside the building. for most of the show the 10 of us camped out in a really great spot near the bathrooms that wasn’t getting too much traffic and had its own bar so we stayed there.

we were at the show where sergio broke his headstock. i don’t think i’ve ever seen a show where sergio stands still the entire time, in the dozens of times i’ve seen him play. he was so close to that monitor/the ceiling but i didn’t suspect his guitar was going to break. i completely missed it because i was looking down at my phone (womp) but i heard everyone audibly gasp. that sucks dude. i think that was the only bummer the whole show though besides the heat and some sloppy drunks. pulses. are friends with zach garren so he was hanging out near us here and there throughout the night. daisy came to the gig so she came and found us, we hung out for a good portion of the show, too! it was a really good chance to talk more too after the gig the night before. she told us a lot about what the florida scene is like. we told her it’s infinitely better than the tri-state area LMAO. at least like, people show up to shows and STAY on a monday night which is insane. and then joseph arrington is a friend of ours so he said hi a couple times during the gig, afterwards him and i talked more when it was quieter.

it is one of the greatest honors in my entire life that joseph arrington sees me as a homie. writing this under the presumption he’s never gonna see this lmao, but i have to pinch myself sometimes. we’ve been friends since we played the last ALLB tour september 2017. i introduced myself and mentioned that we had opened for sianvar’s 2016 tour at webster hall and he actually remembered us. ryan also introduced himself as one of his patreon donors and they talked for like 45 minutes. that show he asked for a CD (and it was years in waiting our older album too yikes lol there’s bangers on there but it doesn’t sound like us anymore) and he messaged me later that night like, “we’re listening in the van right now, you’re a great singer”. we’ve hung out at gigs a couple more times, whether we played together or either ryan or i went to go see him play. the fact he considers us peers is one of the most validating things i have. i’ve learned a lot of helpful insight from him. i have tremendous respect for him and couldn’t be more grateful that he actually likes us as musicians and as people.

all of the bands of course were awesome, i couldn’t stand the heat enough to be inside for every single hail the sun song but i caught most of their set. it’s pretty insane to see them blow up like they have. they deserve it. and i think donovan is one of the best vocalists i’ve ever heard. that whole camp of blue swan musicians are just so talented.

josef, jaime and kris graciously waited outside for me to finish talking to joe arrington, and during that time josef actually caught will swan outside. he said he had the chance to tell will swan deathstar is the reason he plays music and it made him very happy to do so. it had happened like a little bit before i came back outside. we then got lost trying to find the van and hilariously passed the actual entrance to the parking garage like 3 times. it was literally across the street and i led them around the block twice.

we went back to the airbnb for one more swim and we almost had another super late night legit just talking to pulses. kris sat outside editing photos while some of the guys swam, some of us just sat with our feet in the pool. when we got back ryan and santino had been sleeping and i think i maybe saw santino get up once to go to the bathroom. i did really want to go to sleep but ughhhhh i also thought to myself, i can sleep when i get home from tour. i get really bad FOMO every day of my life. so we stayed up and we talked about all things dance gavin dance, blue swan, our local scene, and bein in a band. it’s insane how alike we all are in our way of thinking. i also find it hard to open up to other bands though because it seems like no one else sees playing music and trying to grow a band the way we do. i just wanted to eat up any time i could bonding with pulses., taylor and tyler. thankfully we weren’t up until 4 am again but legit any time up spending time with all of my friends was worth it.

#woodland creatures tour

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doyouneedtorant · 3 years

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september 4, 2021 20:47

So, my roommate told me to start journaling again because I've been depressed and maybe it would make me feel better. I got COVID yesterday. Better yet, I was exposed to COVID on Saturday and only got the positive test result back a week later. I had some symptoms starting Wednesday; nothing that I would have thought was "COVID" but more like allergy or cold symptoms. I should have been more alert, on-guard, monitored heavier. I just didn't. I was dumb. I can admit that. I think also I was just having a very bad week. I felt more alone than usual. You would think on a campus that had been ridiculously over-packed, I would have felt more surrounded. I just didn't. I would go to random places and eat lunch by myself. I would see herds of people travelling together going to eat, to class, going home, going anywhere. My roommates were never home when I was home. It was beginning to feel like a lonely semester. So on top of that, I woke up Friday morning to the notification I had a breakthrough case. I couldn't stop crying. My boyfriend had been with me (thank god he tested negative and he's fine) and when he walked out my bedroom door, I knew I wasn't going to see him for a long time. I sat there, bawling on the floor, and he left to go get a test. He said "if it's positive, I'm coming right back". And then he never came back. My worst fear, being by myself with no interaction with others, had come true. Now, I know where I sound crazy. I should be happy I'm not on a ventilator. That I am not coughing my lungs out. That I can sit here for a week and not have to worry about severe illness. I'm truly lucky to have been vaccinated when I had been and to experience all the things I got to before this happened. It doesn't mean I cannot be sad about it happening. All my friends went out way more than me and not a scratch, not a dent, not a positive test in sight. Just me alone in my room for an additional 7 days. My roommates seem scared of me. I don't blame them. I think I'm just trying to see positives. Maybe this was the universe trying to tell me the same thing my therapist was: stop being so busy. I planned too much and now I cannot do any of it. And maybe that's okay. Maybe it was going to be too much. Seems silly I needed a break right away, but I guess I should be thankful it didn't happen later in the semester. Maybe this will all teach me to be okay with missing out. I get really bad FOMO. I would rather go out and be miserable, then stay inside when I wanted to. Maybe this is how I can give my boyfriend some space. I can be suffocating at times. Maybe this is a way to see what I like deep-down. I was feeling depressed for a bit and wondering if I even liked who I was. I don't know if I do, but it wouldn't hurt to be inside and try to figure that out. Or, maybe it would. I don't think about hurting myself often, but it came up on the first day in here. I wouldn't say it's pathetic that it happened on the first day out of 8, but it's a pretty bleak trajectory. I think I just felt like a disappointment. I was supposed to be the one who never got COVID. The girl who worked at the testing site. The one who supposedly cared too much about COVID. I guess I dropped my guard. Maybe I actually never had one up. I was just supposed to be better. My roommates cancelled their plans. My boyfriend stopped answering my texts often yesterday. My mom and dad seemed disappointed. My sister just sympathetic, I suppose. It was embarrassing to tell a bunch of people you could have gotten them sick.

That might be all for right now, but we'll see if I write later.

Thanks for listening.

#writing #writer #story #rant #vent #covid #covid-19 #depression #sad #feelings #hope #friends #relationship #alone #lonely

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porterblt · 3 years

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Birds and Bees

Right now, I’m sitting on my front porch. It’s 7:30, Everett has been asleep for 30 minutes, there’s a slight breeze, and I hear the birds chirping. And faint sounds of Tommy banging on a piano across the street.

It’s strange and quiet. It’s a Saturday night and Chris and I have no plans. That in itself isn’t new, but.....we have people we could hang out with. We have places we could go. I called my parents, Becca, and Julie....all busy. Katie and Morgan are having a game night with their close friends, who just got vaccinated. It’s so strange. I’m used to night after night, no plans, nothing really to look forward to. I’ve stopped wondering long ago what my friends were up to and just got used to the daily routine of keeping Everett alive, then doing nothing at the end of the day.

Chris and I were lamenting the fact that we can’t just go out to a brewery or eat outside at a restaurant, because Everett is sleeping (and all of our babysitting options are busy). I guess this is our first time having some sort of FOMO with a kid. When he was first born, we knew that we weren’t missing out on much because everyone was locked away at home. This is just a new feeling that I guess we’ll have to get used to?

My anger reared its ugly head again this week. I saw an instagram post and in the comments were new moms humble-bragging about not living their lives any differently this past year and “not living in fear like all you sheep.” That shit makes me SO ANGRY. I quickly jumped on and smacked some bitches (verbally, of course)....but then, predictably, someone angrily replied, then I angrily replied, and it went back and forth several times. My righteous anger slowly fizzled away and I felt left looking like an angry Karen. The girl whose original comment I replied to hopped on and actually responded in a less judgy way..she acknowledged that I was hurting and had empathy for me, but also was upset at my jumping all over her. That really made me feel convicted. After I cooled off I realized that all those people on the internet that I like to jump all over are...actual people on the other side of the screen. It felt right to delete my comments and apologize to the OP. She thanked me and sent me encouraging words. It was healing, in a way.

Speaking of, I started with my new counselor, Tracey. She’s really nice, and I like her style. She actively listens, doesn’t fill the need to awkwardly fill space, asks me additional questions to keep me engaged, and has a better camera so it feels more personal than Zoom. I feel good about it! I’m really hoping that she can help me work through things and adjust better than Sarah did back in June.

Unrelated, I’m going to Washington state next week to testify in a trial for a soldier who was sexually assaulted in 2019. I don’t really remember doing her exam, but I remember the narrative. I did some court prep over the phone with Bonnie present, and they asked me a bunch of questions. I was pretty nervous, but Bonnie said that I did a good job with my answers. So intimidating!! I feel like I should be more excited, but I’m just not particularly excited about being away from Chris and Everett for several days. Everett has not been sleeping well for the past three weeks so I feel bad about leaving Chris to deal with that. I’m also going to have to pump every 3 hours, which is going to be such a huge pain while I’m spending the day in multiple airports. Plus my actual trial day! But I’m going to try to make the most of it. On the bright side, I’m getting a free trip to WA and the week off of work! lol.

Parenting Everett has become more of a joy every day. He’s always been a cute baby, but right now he is SO. CUTE. He just gives me these crinkly-nosed smiles with his little teeth and his happy little eyes. He’ll give a little giggle and start growling. I thought I would love the baby months so much, but they’ve been so so so difficult and isolating. The more independent he’s becoming, the more like myself I’m feeling. It’s become very obvious that self-care is essential for me to function well (read: not have constant meltdowns) and with him relying on us for every single tiny thing, it was very emotionally draining. Now he just LOVES exploring every nook and cranny of the house, going outside and picking up little sticks and leaves, banging his toys together and on every surface, and seeing familiar faces. It’s just so fun and he is getting so independent. It makes my heart swell with joy when he learns a new skill. Tonight, for the first time, he grabbed his little water cup and took a sip. We’ve always held it up to his mouth for him, he’s never actually held it by himself before. And he was so nonchalant about it! Like, little things just randomly happen and it’s like...wow!! Today for the first time I also saw him put a toy in a box, then pull it back out again. Normally he’ll pull all the toys out, and start to put them back in but just keep holding on to the toy and then pull it back out again. I’ve never seen him just drop a toy into a box.

It’s the little things!!!

Final thoughts before my laptop dies: When I think about this time last year, a get a pit in my stomach. I was so pregnant, so scared, so sad. I should’ve been able to go out in public those last few weeks and show off my pregnant belly and cute maternity clothes. I should’ve been nervous and excited, not terrified. I should’ve had my classes teaching me how to expect and breathe through pain during child birth. I should’ve had my parents there at the hospital. I should’ve had my best friends visit me and meet my newborn son. I should’ve had my parents waiting for us when we got home, helping us put things away and clean up the house. Holding Everett so I could shower, or change clothes, or take a nap, or go on a walk. Literally fucking anything.

But I didn’t. This time last year, I cried every day and hid away inside. We had to put in orders for grocery pickups two weeks in advance. We had to wipe down everything with bleach wipes before it came in the house. We had to talk to our friends from several feet away with masks on our faces. I had to stare at my parents with tears in my eyes and not hug them even though I was on the brink of losing it.

Agh. I have to shake my head and try to get those memories out. It’s just too painful.

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oliverphisher · 4 years

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Rowena Holloway

Rowena Holloway is an Australian author of supsense fiction. A former academic, she discovered fiction writing was preferable to the real world and now indulges her love of suspense fiction by writing about Fractured Families and Killer Secrets. Pieces of a Lie is one of the popular book of her.

Pieces of a Lie By Rowena Holloway

Her novels have been nominated for the Ned Kelly Award for crime fiction and her short stories have been published in several anthologies including the Anthology of Award Winning Australian Writing. An avid reader, she occasionally reviews fiction and interviews fellow writers.

You can find out more about Rowena at rowenahollowaynovels.com.

What are one to three books that have greatly influenced your life?

Oh, so many books! My top three would be Sophie’s World by Jostein Gaarder, Caught In The Light by Robert Goddard, and A Dark-Adapted Eye by Barbara Vine.

I read Sophie’s World as part of my studies and I have to admit that at first I viewed reading about all those philosophers as a chore, but Sophie’s journey swept me up and of course there’s a good twist to the story. I think that’s where my appreciation of a layered story began. It’s also about that time that I realised writing was a passion I wanted to pursue though I was undecided whether it would be fiction or non-fiction.

Sophie's World: A Novel About the History of Philosophy (FSG Classics) By Jostein Gaarder

Caught In The Light also left an impression, not just because the story is intriguing but because of the layers to his stories. There is always something else going on beneath the main story line and then around the midpoint that story begins to emerge and you realise the book is about something else and all the clues have been there all along. That was when I decided I liked the freedom of fiction. And that is also when I realised layered stories with twists where my passion.

Caught in the Light By Robert Goddard

A Dark-Adapted Eye was influential because it showed me about character, that all the best characters are flawed and that families can be incredibly cruel to each other under the ‘guise’ of love. Also, Barbara Vine (aka Ruth Rendell) is a brilliant writer. So it was influential for the sheer joy of reading.

A Dark-Adapted Eye (Plume) By Ruth Rendell

What purchase of $100 or less has most positively impacted your life in the last six months (or in recent memory)?

You know, I think I’m going to have to go with a recent lunch with two of my best friends, one of whom I rarely see because she lives eight hours away. It is always great to catch up with good friends and when those good friends share your passion for writing, among other things, it refills the creative well. Writing is a solitary business. You spend a lot of time inside your head with imaginary people or stuck in research or engaged in that dreaded thing called marketing (!) and so it is important to do those things that refresh and encourage your passion. For me, that means spending time with people I love. And when they share my passion for writing there is nothing better—except spending time with my cavoodle, Alfie. Every writer needs a dog! How has a failure, or apparent failure, set you up for later success?

Failure—however we define it for ourselves—set me up to be more resilient and to persevere.

I went through several years of bullying at one workplace and it changed me. My confidence fled, I ate my feelings, and became incapable of seeing anything in a positive way. It all came to a head at one particularly awful conference. Alone in my room I drew up a list of pros and cons about my situation. That’s when I realised that I was on the wrong path and that fiction writing was my passion. From that moment on I hatched my ‘escape plan’. Two years later I was physically no healthier, but my bank balance was healthy enough for me to quit a career I had spent ten years and several degrees working towards.

It was a long road back to health, mentally and physically, but during that journey I learned to stop and breath, to be in the moment, and to centre myself. Things can still become overwhelming but now I stop, breathe and go for a long walk. Then I keep moving forward. Are there any quotes you think of often or live your life by?

Probably the most apt one is “Keep Calm and Carry On”. But the one I find myself saying all the time, and which seems to fit most situations is from Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy. “Don’t panic.” What is one of the best investment in a writing resource you’ve ever made?

Well a notepad that fits into my shoulder bag and handful of pens is probably the best. It’s cheap, available and very useful for when you find yourself with a bright idea or extra time—like in the waiting room at the dentist!

Other than that, I have to say my Mac Air laptop. I take that everywhere. It’s great when I need to get a change of scene or work around other commitments. Over the last couple of years I spent a lot of time in doctors waiting rooms while my elderly mother saw various specialists. I wrote while she saw her specialists and it saved both of us from feeling stressed.

I actually wrote the better part of my Ashes To Ashes psychological thriller series that way. Books one and two were mostly written in waiting rooms or nearby coffee shops.

What is an unusual habit or an absurd thing that you love?

I love my dog, which I realise isn’t absurd, but I also like to sing to him, and about him. And I’m not bothered that I do this while we walk. Not anymore. I’ve been caught a few times by strangers as I sing made up ditties, but I’ve long since learned to ignore my embarrassment.

Anyway, singing to my dog is better than cursing the bullies, which is what I used to do on my walks. In the last five years, what new belief, behaviour, or habit has most improved your life?

Daily walking! It’s helped me get fit and kept me sane.

I’ve walked daily for years and now I get to enjoy with Alfie, who makes me laugh every day. It also gets me out in the sunshine (and rain) and I’ve met many people who have become friends.

And perhaps, now I think about it, it also feeds that belief that everything will be okay once you take a breather.

What advice would you give to a smart, driven aspiring author? What advice should they ignore?

Great question! The hardest lesson to learn—in life and especially as author—is knowing which advice to follow and which to ignore.

First, find your voice before you learn ‘the rules’.This may be a little contentious because often you need to know the rules before you break them in an effective way. However, after years of attending writing courses and writers’ groups I’ve come to the realisation that all those rules can really stifle your voice. So, I recommendthat you write as much as you can until you find your own style, until your unique voice shines through the work. By ‘voice’ I mean the tone, the style and telling the story in a way that honours your characters and the world they inhabit. This differs from your author voice. The difference can be obvious or it can be subtle. Discovering that is part of the journey.

Secondly, I’ll pass on the best advice I ever got: “Don’t mess with your process”. Some people plot and some pants it, some write fast, and some can’t move forward until they perfect what they already have. Most of us are somewhere in between. Honour the way that works best for you. And don’t let anyone mess with your voice. That is what makes you unique.

Finally, surround yourself with people who support your passion. They may not understand it, but if they support it, you are halfway there. Sometimes the most well-meaning people can be the most damaging, and often those people are those closest to you.

What are bad recommendations you hear in your profession often?

People banging on about the rules. Every writing course I ever went to laid out rules they deemed un-breakable. Yet by following these I invariably ended up with a long-winded, stilted and unwieldy story.

Yes, you do need to know what’s accepted and what isn’t in your chosen genre because you need to meet the expectations of your reader. And if you aspire to be traditionally published, you’ll need to meet the expectations of your intended agent or publisher: if they know where your book ‘sits’ in the store, it’s easier for them to sell it—and that helps you get a contract.

But if you focus too early on the rules while trying to write a first draft, it can stifle your creativity. In the last five years, what have you become better at saying no to (distractions, invitations, etc.)?

I say no to lots of things these days. I still suffer from FOMO and worry I’ve missed an opportunity, but as a wise friend of mine once said: “You can do anything, but you can’t do everything.”

The biggest ‘distraction’ I’ve said no to—and it took me a long time to let it go—was teaching writing. I love teaching and enjoy interacting with like-minded people, sharing what I know and learning from them, but it is no longer my passion. Writing is my passion. Not just that, but seeing a book come to fruition. Eventually I realised that I was spending a huge chunk of time preparing teaching materials and less and less doing what I really loved: creating fiction.

I also have a Fear Of Putting Myself Out There, so saying no comes with lots of angst and self-reflection. If I’m saying no because of fear, then I try to push myself outside my comfort zone and say yes. But that is always judged against my goals for writing and health—though I rarely say no to lunch with friends! What marketing tactics should authors avoid?

Don’t shout about your book. Talk about it. Talk about your journey, the story, your characters and your research. Make your potential readers curious. While we all want that immediate sale, effective book marketing is mostly about building relationships.

Avoid anyone who promises to have the magic bullet.

There is no magic bullet. The publishing landscape changes all the time, it’s a crowded market run by algorithms and to be successful in marketing you need to stay abreast of all the changes. Follow people like Joanna Penn and Jane Friedman who are active in the industry and have a track record of good advice and insight.

Sadly, there are unscrupulous people who trade on exploiting our dream.Do your research. Check Writers Beware (https://www.sfwa.org/) for known scams, and join communities like the Alliance of Independent Authors (ALLi) who keep on top of scammers and dodgy publishers.

What new realizations and/or approaches have helped you achieve your goals?

There is an old song that has been running through my head and the chorus goes: “Pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and start all over again.”

You can’t get much better advice than that.

Of course, the difference between intention and action is planning and it is not enough just to have a goal, you have to plan how to achieve that goal. For writers, it always comes down to putting your bum in a chair and your hands on the keyboard (a pen to your notebook; your mouth to dictation software) and getting the words down. It is not always possible to do daily writing or to carve out long tracts of time alone to write, but the more you do it, the easier it flows, and the quicker you will find your process.

And don’t forget to enjoy it!

When you feel overwhelmed or have lost your focus temporarily, what do you do?

I was going to say I walk, which I do, but mostly my first response is to make coffee! I can always tell how well my writing day has gone by howmany half-finished cups of coffee I’ve left around the house… Any other tips?

One of the biggest lessons I’ve learned is this: writing is a valid occupation and there is no shame—and it is not selfish—to pursue a dream if it nurtures your soul. Of course, we all have to live, so it might be something you have steal time to do for a while, but if it is truly your passion, do not give up.

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source https://www.thecommunitywriter.com/blog/rowena-holloway

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notjustagirltattoopodcast · 4 years

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Not Just A Girl: Sex and Sneaky Feminism

You can listen to the sixth episode with Onnie O'Leary here. Or you can find this interview on YouTube with English subtitles/closed captions here, there is no footage for this episode so you'll find a slideshow of Onnie's work instead.

NOT JUST A GIRL: Tattoo Podcast

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Season 1, Episode 6: Sex and Sneaky Feminism

Eddy: Hello friends. Welcome to Not Just A Girl, your favorite feminist tattoo podcast. I'm Eddy and I'm back to share with you the experiences and wisdom of tattoo artists I admire. On the sixth episode, we will be chatting about visual communication, pornographic tattoos, and body positivity.

Before we begin, I would like to acknowledge the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people who are the traditional custodians of this land that was stolen and never ceded. I am honored and grateful to be on the ancestral land of the Awabakal people. And I pay my respects to the Elders past and present. And extend my recognition to their descendants.

I'm super excited this morning to be joined by the fabulous Onnie O'Leary, Onnie works at TLD tattoo in Sydney and their bright and graphic designs inspired by erotic comics are instantly recognizable the world over. I'm actually very lucky to have not one but two tattoos by Onnie and they are definitely some of my favorites in my collection. Thank you so much for taking the time to chat to me today. I've been really looking forward to hearing your stories and about what you've been up to.

Onnie: Oh, thank you. Um, that makes me, makes me feel really bad now. Cause I don't have any tattoos from you yet, even though we've worked together so many times and hung out at conventions and stuff. I'm really sorry, I saw Greg's tattoo. That came up the other day. That was, I think four years ago now.

Eddy: Was it really?

Onnie: It must be. Yeah. Cause that was, he was here for my 30th birthday and I just turned 34. So

Eddy: Oh my god. For our listeners, Greg is taco monster on Instagram and he's so amazing. And you need to check him out.

Onnie: He's really great. Um, he might be a really good person to speak to because he has experience in both tattooing, but also in the medical side of

Eddy: [00:02:17] Yes.

Onnie: Um, what's happening. So he's right in the middle of that at the moment.

Eddy: That's perfect.

Onnie: Yeah. And he's, he's a great person to speak to generally, I'm lucky to have quite a few tattoos from him too. Um, But yeah, actually, so sadly I guess, because Greg has been so busy during this whole pandemic, um, I haven't been speaking to him as much as I would normally. And, um, I guess I've been really lucky to be talking to a whole bunch of artists, mainly in the US some of my friends are over in Europe, so I've been hearing from them a lot. And, uh, but especially sort of in the US and Canada, Um, and speaking to different people from around the country, sort of other tattooers.

Eddy: That must be really helping you get through this whole lockdown situation.

Onnie: Yeah, it is. It is. It's really nice to, um, I guess be able to communicate with people who are in the same situation, even so far away.

And it's definitely unique in that um, it's so universal. I mean, it's people everywhere in the same situation, whether you're in Australia or in the US or anywhere, we're all just kind of staying inside and working on our own things and all, not tattooing at the same time, and as much as I do miss tattooing. And I'm really, really looking forward to getting back to the shop and seeing the guys again, um, I'm also so relieved to actually have a break and not struggle through the FOMO because everyone else is on a break too. And that does, I guess, that like still brings its own set of sort of comparisons and anxieties because everyone sort of seems like has picked up a project for the quarantine period. And so everyone's doing their own amazing things at home. Even if they're not tattooing, you can never really fully get away from it. I think

Eddy: No, creatives are a whole different breed of people and I don't think we ever really stop. Like, it could be something as simple as doodling on a piece of scrap paper or doing a full blown, um, I dunno, art show or whatever, but yeah, there's always something.

Onnie: Starting a whole new podcast.

Eddy: That was, that was silly.

Onnie: I don't know. I don't think it was silly at all. I think um ambitious, certainly, uh, to try your hand at something totally new, but this is such a good time to do it. And I think when you're really driven by wanting to produce something in response to what's happening. There's a real immediacy to, to it that helps you like learn new skills really quickly. Cause you're like, Okay. I just have to get this thing out there and get it done.

Eddy: That's it. I have absolutely no idea what I'm doing. I'm learning on the job, but it's awesome. And the bonus is I get to talk to so many amazing people like you

Onnie: Right? Well, it's just, I guess, in a sense of just sort of a vehicle in that way for you to be able to have these kinds of conversations uh, with people and I've been, I've been thinking a lot in lockdown about the purpose of art in my life and what I don't want to get to morbid, but I'm in like, what do I want out of life? Like, what do I want at the end of this, where's my career going to go after here what's going to happen. And I think that's also a product of speaking to a lot of tattoos who are at different stages of their career, um, and who were sort of opening up their tattooing practice to sort of other art avenues

Eddy: Yeah.

Onnie: As well.

Eddy: Well, it's a smart thing to do moving forward.

Onnie: Yeah. Yeah, it is. Um, and especially when you sort of realize that, uh, it is possible for tattooing to essentially go down overnight.

Eddy: Yeah.

Onnie: Um, and of course, you know, it's never going to stop completely, but suddenly this sort of very regular and reliable stream of income, uh, has been cut off and yeah. As an artist, you can't I don't think you can stop practicing art. Everything that you do is art. Whether it's making a sandwich or a painting or doing your laundry

Eddy: Taking a selfie

Onnie: Taking a selfie yes. It's all about, um, the way that you do things and the attention and care that you've put into doing them. Yeah. So thats, uh, I I've been trying to, uh, try and really focus on that.

Eddy: Yeah. I think it's like really natural for an artist as well to consider what their work means as as their message for what they leave behind in their life. Like, you know, a lot of people don't get the opportunity to actually make an imprint on the world the way that artists do. Like we have the opportunity to create a visual language. If visual arts is our thing and then communicate our ideas and beliefs to the world. And I know that that's important to you.

Onnie: Yeah, very much so. And I was saying that the older and older, I get the harder and harder ease to try and like, I guess, disguise, um, my own sort of personal beliefs and what what I do want to project, it's almost like impossible to try and sever that for some sort of alternative purpose. Um, so I definitely, I mean, the more that I practice, the more sort of, uh, I guess specialization I'd like to have in my work in terms of being able to sort of control the um, the content of what I'm doing and being able to sort of dictate a lot of the content of the tattoos. Um, I think just because these are going to be the projects, these are going to be the only projects I feel like I'll be able to work on really honestly and passionately.

Eddy: Yeah, absolutely.

Onnie: And exactly what that looks like at this point. I'm not sure I'm, uh, I'm one of those tattooers who spent a really long time at art school. And I, there's a, there's a sense there that you sort of have to come up with a concept initially, and then you mold the work to facilitate that concept. And that's something that I've found really difficult. And I really struggled with for a long time, because often I feel like once the concept is formed, the art is kind of superfluous anyway.

Eddy: Yeah.

Onnie: So I've been trying to, I guess, sort of let emotion or just interest I think when I feel passionately interested in something to let that guide the work in a way, I want it to be a lot more fun then trying to wrangle that visual language into a poem. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, that can be sort of easily and clearly read by anyone as much as I want people to be able to read and understand my work. Umm. I kind of have to step back and have a little bit less control over exactly what it says and how it says just to let it come out.

Eddy: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. I I've. I found like I didn't approach tattooing with like, an idea of what I wanted to do. I just kind of like learnt the techniques. And then from there was like, who am I? Where do I go from here? What do I like? And then it's just been this like ongoing journey of like discovering what I like and then learning to apply apply that to my tattoo. It's so interesting how we all have such a different journey of finding our way to authenticity in our work and to finding our own like visual language that feels comfortable.

Onnie: Yeah. And it's often such a surprise. That's been one of the things that's been really beneficial to having all of these discussions with different artists is often they will see things in your work that are there, that you have no idea. Um, And one of, one of my friends said to me, he's like, Oh Onnie, it's all about control. It's just all about control with you. I was like, Oh my God, I feel like this is maybe the linchpin of like my whole practice is this sense of control. Um, in terms of, uh, power exchanges. I mean, all of the kind of bondage girls that I do that sort of very literal. But I think even at the time, a lot of, uh, a lot of the time they were metaphors, I guess, for things that I was struggling with in my life, but there's still a very strong sense of trying to explore control and retain it, even in my own role as an artist, even in the greatest sense of being a tattooer where you sort of welcome someone into your studio and you have this like enclosed environment where you have a certain role to play, they give up a certain amount of control to you. There's a huge amount of trust there because you're going to physically hurt people. And. Um, I'm kind of like, Oh my God, this, maybe this is just what attracted me to tattooing in the first place.

Eddy:] Yeah.

Onnie: So I'm really, I'm really learning a lot, not just about, um, my art, but I think that about me as well.

Eddy: Yeah. Thats one of the things that that I find. So, um, enticing about your work, that the characters you depict have power. They have so much power, especially these women. I see so many erotic art subjects kind of, uh, giving up their power. Like they look sad or they look hurt, but yours are like I'm loving this. It's so good. And you know, you just, you just get this real sense of strength in them and you know, so, you know, you can tell that that's what, where you're coming from and that's what you're searching for.

Onnie: Good. I'm really, I'm really glad that, um, you, you said that that's a hundred percent how I want the work to be read. And its been a long process of, um, I'm really glad that you were talking about visual languages because that's what it is. There's certain things that you can do within your art or how you depict someone or how you draw something, whether it's the angles that your, um, the audience is looking from. And that's something I really consider the colors that you use. Uh, the, the techniques, the way that you paint or draw something, they all contribute to how the audience reads an artwork. And, uh, it's often through, it's been through some really challenging conversations in the past, um, that I've come to terms with those, because I think as much as I want to make artwork of like sexy, big booby girls, there's already so much of that.

And what, what am I saying that's different? Or like, why, why do I want to make this kind of work? You know, when I'm not seeing it in the world, what is it that, what is it that I'm not seeing in other drawings of sexy, big booby girls? And what can I contribute to that conversation? How am I going to change things? Um, And actually one of my, um, someone on Instagram, I put up a questionnaire this morning, asking people what they wanted to hear me talk about. And one of the questions was about my influences. So one of the biggest influences that I had in my work is Heavy Metal magazine. And

Eddy: I can tell when I see that

Onnie: I'll send you some photos of like my favorite covers and stuff so you can get it. Um, when, when I was about 17, I was drawing, it was the first time I'd ever, um, sort of drawn a porno comic. So as my friend, who was the writer, gave me a couple of magazines, give me a copy of hustler and, uh, like four copies of heavy metal. And I kind of flipped through hustler and was like, yup, cool, whatever sort of vagina. And when I got to heavy metal, I was so entranced. This was the first time I'd seen women of like vastly different body shapes, body types, skin colors, some of them were aliens. And this is definitely something that I'm trying to bring into. Um, the comics that I'm working on with Tom at the moment, but that was such an eyeopening thing for me. And really, I sort of decided there. And then when I was 17, I was like, I want to make sexy drawings of women that make them feel good about their own bodies. It was the first time that I'd sort of seen this kind of exuberant sexuality, uh, these different body types and that kind of right I guess, to enjoy sex that if someone makes a picture of it and they're like, this is what I think is sexy and you look at it and go, that's like me I could be sexy too.

Eddy: Yeah, absolutely. The diversity and the sex positivity in your work is what makes it stand out above everyone else doing erotic tattooing in my opinion, like it's just, when I look at, you know, the girls that have a little, they have a little pot belly, or they'll have a hip dip, that one boobs a bit saggier than the other. And it's like, I see that in the mirror and that's so sexy that image you've done and yeah, I can relate.

Onnie: Totally. And it's, you know, everyone's worthy of like praise and admiration and like lust and that's it. And especially growing up, I felt like I only saw a really narrow um, sort of ideal for what could be sexually attractive.

Eddy: Yeah.

Onnie: So I'm definitely pleased to see that, like, especially in tattooing, I feel like, um, erotic tattoos have really taken off. Um, yeah, since I started, there were two tattoos that I knew of when I started one was Dusty Neal who works at, uh, Black Anvil in, uh, Fort Wayne in the US and the other is Herman Canela, who is from Buenos Aires. And I'll send you some of their work as well, and I've never been tattooed by Dusty. It's one of my great regrets so far, I'd love to go and meet him and get tattooed by him because he was so kind of generous with his time and his knowledge and, uh, even just his attention. I think he started following me when I was an apprentice, and I shat myself. I was so excited, this is amazing. I'm like heres a guy who's doing bondage tattoos, like not just a little bit cute and sexy pinups, which is sort of where I initially saw my work sort of slotting in.

Eddy: Yeah.

Onnie: Tattooing I'm like these were full on erotic tattoos. And I was like, well, if that guy can do it, so can I.

Eddy: Its so good. And there's definitely such an important place for that in tattooing. Cause I mean, I'm, I'm guilty as well of being another one of those tattooers who does the pinup girl that's just like that prescribed version of normal. That's like skinny, white, Caucasian looking features, just like just so boring and lacking diversity. And it's just something you do without even thinking about it. Like, it's just like, that's, what's done. That's how it's always done. That's how you do it. But you've challenged that.

Onnie: Well. Yeah. And that tattooing tattooing is so much about iconography. Um, you're representing vast concepts for people in, by necessity, very simple imagery. You know, if you, you know, a tattoo of a pinup girl, it doesn't represent, this is the girl that the tattoo is off. That's a tattoo of love or longing or lust or desire or femininity or appreciation. And if you get a tattoo of a ship, you know, that means travel and journeys and. Um, so all of these concepts get distilled into very, very, very simple imagery. And, um, I mean, even with the work that you do, which no one would ever describe as like simple, even if you think about the concepts that you're doing, you know, uh, it's, it's sort of birds and flowers and these for the person who's getting them I imagine that the meaning is much more complex than I like birds and flowers.

Eddy: Yeah, absolutely.

Onnie: So actually doing. Doing the comic book. I should introduce the comic book a little bit more, but doing this comic book has been amazing because suddenly where I had to try and condense all of this stuff about women's power and sexual pleasure and enjoyment and diversity. Uh, now I have actual space for a narrative.

Eddy: Amazing.

Onnie: And that's so, uh, so daunting and so freeing, because it's really the opposite of what, of what I've been doing as a tattooist for years and years.

Eddy: Well.

Onnie: So that's, that's been really positive.

Eddy: Talking about the comic. How did it get started? And please tell the listeners all about that because it's so amazing.

Onnie: Okay. So, so the comic, we started a little company called One Handed Comix and that's me and Ugly Tom who's a, uh, an amazing tattooer, uh, over in Charlotte, in North Carolina. And we started chatting. Sam Rulz showed me his work, I think about two years ago now and was like, You'd love this guy's work. He's really great. He free hands, literally every tattoo, every tattoo, and as well as doing his own like massive projects, uh, tattoo projects that he's working on body suits and things like that. He's also a walk in tattooer occasionally. So if you want like a freehanded Polynesian half sleeve. Or, you know, some like drama masks doesn't matter. He will just draw that straight on you and then tattoo it.

Eddy: The confidence

Onnie: He's obviously like a very, very hardworking and inspiring, uh, tattooer, and so I've been following him for a while and we would chat here and there I'm pretty chatty online. Um, and especially when I really admire someone's work, so we sort of chatted a little bit back and forth. He said, he was like, Oh, this dude's pretty friendly. And then I heard he was on another podcast and I heard him speaking it was about an exhibition that he was having that was supposed to happen this month, um, that is ofcourse not going on at the moment. So we started talking about the themes that he brought up in the podcast, which were about religion and spirituality. And I had like a ton of stuff to say about all of this and sent him a message and then was like, hang on this isn't enough just started leaving him huge voice messages about it. And he wrote back and I guess, I think this was maybe a week or two before we went into lockdown here in New South Wales. And so it'd be about two and a half months ago, I think is the end of March two and a half months now. So, uh, no a month.

Eddy: I can't believe

Onnie: I'm so confused

Eddy: Yeah I don't know. Time, wibbly wobbly timey wimey.

Onnie: It's a loose concept at this point, a while ago. It feels simultaneously very quick and a million years ago. Uh, and so we were chatting away about that. He had a bunch of stuff to say in response to it, and then I had more opinions about it. He had more opinions about that and we were chatting away. And we were like, Hey, maybe we should just do a split sheet you know, we'll do like a little bit of, um, flash each and see how that goes. And then that very quickly turned into, we should make a comic together. And it should be a porno comic.

Eddy: Perfect.

Onnie: Perfect, and that was it. Like, and now, um, you, but tattooing was kind of tough. I mean, it's such a great job, but it can be kind of tough, man that comic book. So it's been it's yeah I guess it's been about a month and a half or nearly two months. We are almost ready to send this 16 page comic book to the printer. Almost.

Eddy: There's a lot of work in that.

Onnie: There's a huge amount of work. Um, but it's been such a joy to work so collaboratively with someone because it really is a truly collaborative effort where we sort of workshop the story together. Then we kind of talk about a layout. We'll do a rough, a very rough layout where we, you know, with stick figures, this panel should be from this angle and this panel should be from that angle. And the big explosion should happen on the bottom half of this page. And we'll sort of show each other ideas. Talk about them, talk about what we like. What we don't like then, uh, he, Tom has been doing the inks. And so I mentioned that he freehands, everything. Um, he's almost totally analog. So all of his contribution to the comic book is physically inking the sheets and then scanning them and then sending them to me.

Eddy: Wow.

Onnie: And then I work digitally over the top of them. Um, so we sort of go back and forth. So I will take his large layout. Digitally pencil um, all of the girls and the parts of the page that I'm drawing, send that back to him. He grids it up by hand to transfer all of my pencils onto the final page. All of his parts scans, those sends them to me. I then redrop my pencils in there, ink those over the top. And then I do a rough and then we talk about the colors and then I do the final version.

Eddy: Wow. That's amazing though, to be able to collaborate, like on such an equal level with another artist, I feel like the communication involved in that would be really difficult, but it sounds like it's working.

Onnie: It is yeah, it is working and I definitely don't think that it would be possible with just anyone. Um, I really, uh, I think we've definitely grown to be really close friends over the process and part of that's because there have been some really difficult discussions and I don't think I realized at the beginning how, um, Uh, I guess like how important these kind of discussions would be in terms of dictating the content of the comic and how much it's forced me to take a lot of ideas that I have in my own work about representing women and sex and forced me to examine them, pull them apart, and then be able to explain them back to someone.

Eddy: Yeah.

Onnie: And especially, uh, someone who, you know, who lives on the other side of the world, who's a different gender to me, has very different like, uh, romantic experiences. Um, and it's been, it's been really, really great to, uh, I guess, speak so openly and honestly, about what started off as like a kind of fun sexy art project, but it's actually pooled up and forced me to really analyze my own beliefs and motivations about this kind of stuff.

Eddy: That's soo amazing.

Onnie: Yeah.

Eddy: That's what arts for.

Onnie: Exactly. Exactly. I think without that sort of mirror into, um, into the world, sometimes you just don't recognize yourself or your own ideas. So.

Eddy: And the fact that you've had to explore what you believe and why you believe that, and then figure out how to express that that expression is going to be so much more authentic and so much clearer and have such a bigger impact on your audience.

Onnie: I hope so. And as much as I don't think that I would label this a feminist comic. Um, it's not that, not that it's not feminist, it's unashamedly feminist just by virtue of what it is, but I also just want to say that there's like a lot of really messy sex in there. And, um, it's. Deeply pornographic. Uh, the comics are called One Handed Comix because the idea is that you have to, you can read them one handed. I'm pretty sure everyone's been masturbating a lot in captivity. And so the whole idea of this comic kind of came out of like trying to meet a need for people.

Eddy: Yes, adult toy companies are doing so well right now.

Onnie: I'll bet they are. If anyone wants to send me a vibrator, I'll happily accept them, um, at the shop, just look up the TLD shop address, and then send through whatever you've got.

Eddy: Onnie can sponno those, uh, friggin sex toys.

Onnie: Yeah. I'll I'll, I'll get you to put the address up at the end so that peple know where to send them.

Eddy: Get you some of those crazy alien ones to go with those alien babes you draw.

Onnie: Oh my God. The alien egg ones. I want that. It's so intensely weird. I really love that. I really don't mean weird in the negative sense. Um, But like, I have a deep interest in those like alien egg. Like I think it's called, like, Ovipositor I may be wrong, I read that, that vice article, like five times and every time I'm like, Oh my God.

Eddy: Every time I see a picture it takes me a moment to like, Oh, Oh yes. That's what it is, huh.

Onnie: Just imagine like sort of wobbling around the house, like just laying alien eggs for my flatmate to find.

Eddy: Amazing. And that's what I'm excited about with your, with your comic, the fact that it's, it's going to be so much more interesting and kink friendly and women friendly and trans friendly and like all of these like different people who aren't represented in mainstream pornography. Like they get to have a place now.

Onnie: Yeah. Yeah. And that's, that's really important. I mean, like I said, like the first issue is only 12 pages long, so, um, and we've got a couple of extra, we've got like one little extra story and a couple of like fun sort of cute fake ads that we made to go in it. So, um, I don't, I don't want to run the risk of disappointing people by talking about like the incredible diversity in it. When the initial story that we've got is pretty, uh, I mean, it has a limited number of characters. So that also means that there's kind of a limited number of, um, things that we can touch on really.

Eddy: Yeah.

Onnie: But that is very much the plan in terms of making more. And we've sort of god, I don't want to jinx it, but like we've we talked about making more of them and that's, that's something that we'd both really like to do. And we're going to try and get as much done while we're in isolation. And then afterwards, I think we're gonna try and work out a way to balance tattooing and making comics because it's something we both really want to continue. Um, But I mean, having it be kind of set in space and giving, giving us that gives us the option of like non human aliens, who can be any gender, any race, um, they can exist in sort of any sort of form that you as the author illustrator want them to take. And I really liked that because I love the idea of being able to present something that might seem different and unusual. Uh, here on earth, but in this comic you can have, um, well, this is just the like polyamory planet and everyone lives like this and it's super normal and everyone's really happy.

And we talked a little bit about the Netflix show Hollywood I think that was very, very much a fantasy rewriting of history. And there's something sort of joyful and positive about that where you can say, look, this is the, this is the future that we, or the past that the sort of dimension that we want to imagine things have happed in. And then from that you can kind of go, well, maybe this is possible.

Eddy: Yeah. That's, what's so good about SciFi it gives you the space of endless possibilities and to just imagine this really optimistic, wonderful world that you can enjoy.

Onnie: Yeah. Yeah. And especially in terms of, um, sort of different forms of activism. I do want to talk about that as well, because I don't necessarily think that the solution to achieving equality is just to kind of whitewash everything and say, well, let's just imagine if everything was wonderful right now. Um, and, but that, that is part of it. And at this point in time, uh, like I was saying, that's, I'm really following my interests and, and this is something that I really want to make, I want to provide kind of a bit of escapism for people, um, and yeah. Make people hopeful and, and feel better about the situation that we're all in at the moment.

Eddy: I'm sure people are going to absolutely love it.

Onnie: I really, I really hope so. I really, really hope so. Um, Yeah. I hope people like it as much as I am enjoying drawing it and

Eddy: I love that you're enjoying drawing it. That makes it even better.

Onnie: It's so much fun. I'm going to confess something here. Uh, a lot of people have been asking if drawing a porno comic makes you horny. And look, the company line on this sorry Tom the company line on this is that actually, you know? Sure. Maybe, but we're really focusing on things aside from just the content, like the composition and all of this. So look, it's not like some kind of total fuckfest, but also honestly it does make you kind of horny.

Eddy: No harm in that.

Onnie: It's really hard not to draw porn all day and think about exactly what it is that would turn someone on about a particular scene without getting a little bit turned on. I only hope that that is passed onto the reader of this and that everyone gets at least a little bit turned on from reading it.

Eddy: I think so. I think with your tattoos and your art, like you can definitely see the joy you've had in creating it and that that's a hundred percent passed on to the viewer and that's why people get your tattoos. So that's going to happen with the comic too.

Onnie: Um, I also feel like the comics really pushed my artwork dramatically. I've been forced to go back and study a lot of anatomy. Um, a lot of movement, uh, talking about communicating a narrative, just in images. And I'm going back to a lot of my roots and like rereading a lot of my old heavy metal magazines to get inspiration and to help decide, you know, how we want the comic to look and to feel and what we need to do to do that.

So I'm so excited to get back to tattooing and just feel like I've leveled up all of these skills. Um, You know, even, even more in this time. So I'm, I'm keen to like, yeah. Apply that to tattooing again and pushing, or I guess having an implied narrative in my work is really important because I want part of what excites that audience so much is to imagine who these characters are, what they're doing, what's happening, what they're about to encounter. Um, and so, yeah, I mean, for the comic there's, I mean, there's a direct narrative there, but you also don't show every single thing in a story. And so you have to, the viewer has to get from one panel to the next and understand what's happening. And that is really something that I want to push with tattooing. I'd really like to move beyond the simplistic iconography of what tattoos are, even though I love that so much about tattoos. I think what I want from my work is to be able to communicate more with an image.

Eddy: Yeah. I can see that happening because your work is so dynamic. There is a lot of like room for storytelling in that.

Onnie: Cool. I'm so glad. I mean, your boxer girl, like.

Eddy: I love her

Onnie: She's a good example

Eddy: Onnie did, for our listeners Onnie did this amazing, like strong, muscular, angry boxer woman on me with like skin tears around it. It's so good.

Onnie: She's like fighting out of, out of your leg. Um, but you know, she's really like, she's kind of like a little bit like rough. It's obviously not the, uh, not the beginning of the fight, but it's not the end either. So I want you to think about like, Who is she? Why is she fighting so hard? Is she gonna win? Maybe, maybe not.

Eddy: Damn right she's gonna win. It might get a bit, a bit like difficult there towards the end, but she'll come out triumphant. I can guarantee.

Onnie: Spit out the tooth

Eddy: Spit the blood on the canvas.

Onnie: And that's I mean, that's kind of the artwork that grabs me the most is when I continue to like turn it over in my head after I've seen it and try and try and pull it apart and try and figure out what's what's happening. So

Eddy: I think, Oh, what about other guests? Brody, who I spoke to the other day. You did a lovely tattoo on them of a special moment.

Onnie: Yeah. Um, Oh, that was, that was so nice. It was really lovely to have Brody in the shop and, um, uh, yeah. Get to know them and get to do a really fun tattoo. And I think does Brody work with Sera Helen?

Eddy: Yes.

Onnie: Yeah, at Crucible. Yeah. Uh, she's also amazing I'm wearing her today.

Eddy: I noticed that. Yeah, Sera's incredible.

Onnie: The girl with all the tribal tattoos, riding the dragon tat gun. It's amazing.

Eddy: So much talent in that studio and in the one you work in as well.

Onnie: Oh, yeah, the boys are fantastic. It's really, it's been really, really good. And it's nice to work in a studio where the, I guess the art style is say same, same, but different. Um, I always like to think that my work is pretty firmly rooted in traditional tattooing in that I'm trying to make, uh, you know, bright, solid colors, clean black lines. Um, I want them to age well. But I'm just putting them together in a slightly different way than Trad Trad.

Eddy: Yeah.

Onnie: But I've learned so much in the last couple of years that I've, I've worked there. They're all really amazing tattooers.

Eddy: And they all have that same kind of thing. The really bright, bold colors, crisp black lines it's just so powerful as a tattoo and it will age so well, that kind of work.

Onnie: Well, that's it. Yeah, I'm really proud. I think I've gotten tattooed by everyone at the shop now, at least, at least once. And they all look amazing. Um, and yeah, it's really nice. They get a lot of, a lot of compliments on, um, on those sets that the guys did. Yeah, I do miss them.

Eddy: It's so hard being away from the colleagues. Cause I think we spend more time with them than we do in our own homes. And then suddenly you're not seeing them every day and it's just like, Oh, I wonder, I wonder what they're doing right now.

Onnie: Do they still think of me?

Eddy: We have a little group chat where it's like, there's a lot of memes and a lot of little, I miss you gifs and just like love hearts and rainbows to each other.

Onnie: I have to say at the beginning of, uh, isolation, the memes were fire.

Eddy: Oh my God

Onnie: People, there were so many good ones. Things have seriously declined since then, my favorite meme group on Facebook have descended into jorts and Shrek memes, and they have a boomer Thursday now and like I could take just boomer Thursday was just, people would just post terrible boomer memes, you know, where it's like, the punchline is always like I hate my wife. And I can try to take that. Like I kind of, I enjoy the irony of it that you can't have like three ironic meme days out of a week when we're all home all the time. I'm like you can make a jorts thread, you can make a Shrek thread. I don't want to see that all, like I intensely disliked jorts now.

Eddy: I have to admit I'm not yet as developed in my understanding and taste of memes. I mostly just stick to the Elle Woods Legally Blondes memes.

Onnie: Well, that's fine. You've got Brooke and Siarn there and they're on fire.

Eddy: Brooke is the meme queen.

Onnie: Yes, Yes. Oh my God.

Eddy: Um for our listeners Brooke is a one of the amazing artists I work with and I don't think anyone has ever been better at sharing memes than, than Brooke, or even in her drunken state, creating them.

Onnie: Does she have her own meme page yet?

Eddy: Not yet, but I have been begging her to do a meme page and a YouTube channel. You should see some of the videos she's left on my phone when we've partied.

Onnie: I know.

Eddy: I'll send them to you.

Onnie: I would follow the YouTube channel Brooke at the Hamo

Eddy: Right.

Onnie: We'll just call it The smoking section,

Eddy: Havin a fuckin duzza at the Hamo.

Onnie: I know next time, the next time I come up, I really want to come and party with you guys. And you should come out too, um, but yeah mainly

Eddy: We, last time we worked out, we can do it at my house when Amy was here. We just like had a fashion show and went through my

Onnie: I saw the fashion show

Eddy: My costume box and it was lit.

Onnie: Oh man. Yeah. That'd be great to have a fashion show again. I mean, I've been buying a ton of clothes from like my tattooer mates and that's, that's been awesome. Um, but mainly I just live in my like yoga pants these days.

Eddy: I can't wait till we're all back at New Zealand, um, Tattoo and Art Convention, and your booth, where you and Sam are always on fire and bring the fashion. I remember your Christmas theme booth last year. Sam's always just glitter and rainbows.

Onnie: I just want to say for anyone out there that is thinking about doing a Christmas theme booth, don't do it. People don't like it.

Eddy: I loved it

Onnie: I was so excited to do this Christmas booth. I thought people were going to be really into it. I'm like who doesn't love Christmas. It's the happiest time of the year. People don't like Christmas. They don't want Christmas tattoos not an convention anyway. Um, the only way that I could get people into it was to like tie my shirt up.

Eddy: It became smutty Christmas,

Onnie:] It was smutty Christmas. I mean, it was already smutty Christmas, All the Christmas designs with smutty Christmas designs, but

Eddy: I wear the hell out of your smarty Christmas shirt. That's like, it's like a weekly, like thing that I wear that shirt as soon as it comes out of the wash it's back on again.

Onnie: Amazing. I'm so happy about that. I still have, I still have quite a few like big sizes in that, because I think the last shirt I did was black and it's like, I sold out of XLs straight away. So I got a bunch of XLs made up in this one, but are ran out of smalls first up, I think. Yeah, that was all the girls wanted a pink shirt with the bondage babe on it just sitting on top of this guy

Eddy: Was so good.

Onnie: Yeah. But I am, I am really, really looking forward to that. I hope that's going ahead in November. Um, but if not, you know, the years just go faster and faster now. So yeah.

Eddy: Yeah they do, I can't believe it's May already we'll be back to tattooing in no time. I'm sure.

Onnie: I thought you were going to say November.

Eddy: Please no. How, like, how do you reckon this current situation is going to affect tattooing? Like, or how we experience art even?

Onnie: Um, I I'm really hoping that it reminds people just how important art is in these times, um, in whatever capacity, whether you're talking about a tattooing or theater, film, or movies, I've been listening to so much music, uh, and really. I guess really kind of examining all of this, this stuff that I'm looking at, whether it's the books I'm reading or the TV shows that I'm not watching while I draw, or the artwork that I'm making, um, and how that has the capacity to make you feel less alone and less isolated in your, in your circumstances. Um, so I hope that that gives people a sense of like greater importance or that there's greater importance placed on, um, on the arts at the same time I think things are going to be really different. I mean, here in Australia, we, uh, I think the majority of tattooers are eligible for some form of welfare welfare generally. Um, Job Keeper.

Eddy: Yeah. If they're residents. Yeah.

Onnie: If they're residents, um, but uh, over in the US that's not the case, they don't have the same. They don't have any welfare for tattooers.

Eddy: It's so ridiculous.

Onnie: It's ridiculous. Well, because it's also illegal for them to open up. And so people are fighting for the right to reopen their studios, um, which is dangerous still dangerous.

Eddy: Yeah. It's difficult because you

Onnie: Cause I'm a big expert.

Eddy: Yeah. Well, that's it like what, none of us are really experts, but like, you know, from what we're told, it's it's dangerous. But then at the same time, of course, they're going to fight. They're terrified. They're not going to pay their rent or eat or look after their families. It must be so scary. And artists just, I mean, imagine being an isolation without art. We just couldn't do it.

Onnie: Well that's just, that's just solitary confinement.

Eddy: Exactly. Like we need to respect artists and look after them.

Onnie: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And I mean, expecting, I mean, cutting off people's livelihood, but expecting them to still maintain all of their outgoings, um, is ridiculous and impossible. So yeah. Um, I'm very, I'm very worried for my friends over there. Um, I don't, uh, I don't really have a clear idea yet of what that's going to mean for tattooing, whether that means you have, uh, artists moving out of tattooing into a more secure job. Um, I think the situation would be similar to Australia where there's not even if you move out of the job that you've got now, which job are you going to move into?

Eddy: Yeah.

Onnie: So I guess I'm sort of withholding, um, my opinion until I know more or I can actually make any kind of informed guess.

Eddy: Yeah, it could go back to the way it was, you know, in the early days in Western tattooing where, you know, it was a tattoo shop and a barber shop and, you know, multiple other kind of trades all in one little, little house.

Onnie: Well, that's it. I don't know if you've been to Sleeve Masters here in Sydney.

Eddy: No I haven't.

Onnie: It's still, it's the same venue that it's been, and it's this tiny, tiny, narrow shop. And you come in and there's a counter. And then there's the tattoo studio. And that the artists chair, and then there's like a little room behind that I think with like a sink, but the toilet's not even in the shop.

Eddy: Wow.

Onnie: Um, so, you know, it's very, very old school and, uh, and really, really tiny. And I do kind of love that atmosphere. Um, it's very different to sort of the big, calm, open spaces of a lot of studios nowadays, but yeah. Uh, it's, it's definitely a fun spot to get tattooed in. So I wouldn't be mad if we had more kind of like just figure it out as you go along tattoo shops, you know as long as everyone's clean, then it's fine.

Eddy: Yeah. There's a space like I think, you know, there's a risk that we'll lose walk-in shops, but I think if people are creative, we can have like lots of different ways of going about tattooing that's still safe. And I guess like, Legal so that we can operate without getting fined, but you know, like we can get creative with it.

Onnie: There's like so much money lying around now

Eddy: Yeah. Anyway, um, I want to go back to something you mentioned earlier about. Um, the discussions you have regarding feminism or, you know, different opinions and theories and how to mitigate them. Cause I know that that's something that you talk about a fair bit and that we were talking about before this interview, um, like what, what, what is, what is your approach?

Onnie: Um, I guess in in these kinds of discussions. I think it's really important to God is there's a couple of things. Um, these are often really hard discussions to have, and I like to choose my words really carefully. Um, you know, because it's, I think it's easy for meaning to be misconstrued. So, Ummm. I think that listening is of course really important. I think that the majority of times, if you're discussing, I think that the pros for feminism and the cons for feminism, when you have two different people coming at it from opposing sides, I think often they want the same solution. But have very different ideas about either what feminism is or means um, and don't fully understand it. And I think the opposite can also happen, um, where you can assume someone's intentions or, and, uh, and both it's very easy, I guess, to misconstrue what the other person's saying, or to really stick to your assumptions about what they're saying. And the most successful discussions I've had have, I guess also taught me something about, about the other person, about the way that the other person thinks, um, about their sort of fears or apprehensions.

And when you can get to the root of those emotions, that's when you have an opportunity to I guess change someone's mind or actually make them receptive to hearing your experience. Yeah. Um, and again, look like, like I said earlier, this having these kinds of discussions is a lot of work. You know, it really does require effort not to let your emotions overpower you when you feel really passionate about something. And that's absolutely something that I I struggle with, and Greg will tell you, we've had some discussions about feminism where we've just been like, look, we just agreeing to disagree here. And he fucking loves, he loves to wind me up.

Eddy: But that's how we, that's how we learn to like the, the discussion back and forth. Like, you know, I wasn't always a feminist. I didn't always have the knowledge I have now, but it's through understanding that it was the fear that's like been bred into me by society of all of these changes and all these like dynamics. I don't understand. And then once you start to understand those and understand how they affect our behavior and our language and everything like that, then you can start making those changes, but you have to be able to have a conversation and be challenged but listen.

Onnie: Yes. Yeah, that's so important. And I think everyone grows up like that. You, you grow up, uh, trying to understand the status quo and how to fit into that. I mean, that's what being a person is about. And I think that. Uh, fitting in with other people is something that's really hardwired in us. Um, and so if you live in a patriarchal society, which we do, um, those are going to be seen as the ideas that are normal and acceptable and right. And it's yeah. It's like you say, until you realize that maybe your own experience or the experiences of others or the things that you see in the world, uh, don't add up. Then that's when you begin to question and challenge that, um, but people can spend a lot of their time, uh, often their whole life trying to fit in. And so when you challenge that, that, that becomes a very personal confrontation.

Eddy: Yeah.

Onnie: Um, Just because they've invested so much in maybe suppressing these things in themselves that you're embracing and saying, Hey, we don't have to put up with that. That's not actually right. And let's do something about it.

Eddy: Yeah.

Onnie: And you feel like you've been fighting in the wrong direction, your whole life. Like, Oh my God. I thought if I just conformed that I would be happy. And now you're saying I have to rail against conformity in order to be happy.

Eddy: Yeah. It's hard how are we? We just want to be normal, but then being normal is actually quite toxic because who does, who prescribes normal anyway, and it's just.

Onnie: That's it. And there is no normal there's no,

Eddy: No, there shouldn't be.

Onnie: I've never met a normal person in my whole life. Even the most normal people that you meet might have some giant Koi tattoo on their back that you don't know about. And tattoos are definitely not normal.

Eddy: No, no. Anyone with a tattoo is a freak.

Onnie: Absolutely. I think we can all agree on that. Especially porno tattoos.

Eddy: Yeah. If you've got a fucking like shunga tattoo then nah, you don't belong. Nope. Sorry guys.

Onnie: Actually, someone, someone did say like what one of the Instagram questions was. Um, if you've had any negative reactions to your work as, as an erotic tattooer, um, And sometimes yes, people have those kinds of reactions. My favorite thing, this comes up all the time at conventions, like some people will wander off that, look at the really filthy stuff, then I'll be like, why would anyone even get this? People get tattoos of things that they like and some people like blowjobs.

Eddy: Yeah.

Onnie: Um, you know, there's sort of an idea of if you're going to get tattooed, there's a certain set of things or parameters that you can, you can acceptably get tattooed sometimes, you know, people say, well, it has to be really meaningful. Has to be something you would never change your mind about.

Eddy: The thing I hate when they're like, Oh, it's something that, you know, you won't be ashamed of on your wedding day. Like what. Who give a fuck. Put a fucking dick on my forearm for my wedding day please.

Onnie: Done. I'll see you after quarantine. Are you going to renew your vows with like a nice big, like forehead dick.

Eddy: Like, um, that the woman in that old tattoo book that got around about a decade ago where she's got like all of these dicks across her chest and butt, and there's like the cockroaches and everything.

Onnie: Is it the Dave Lum Yeah. The Dave Lum necklace,

Eddy: I think so.

Onnie: The dick necklace.

Eddy: Yeah.

Onnie: For anyone, for anyone wondering, uh, what I look like. Um, me and that lady are fairly physically similar. I do not have a Nicholas, a dick necklace.

Eddy: Not yet anyway.

Onnie: A dick nicklas. But I wish I did. Um, I deeply regret never getting tattooed by Dave Lum. And I've been really lucky when I'm in the States to see a bunch of his tattoos in the flesh. Sadly, never the dick necklace one day.

Eddy: One day.

Onnie: Yeah. So it's actually, it's funny that you bring that up. Cause of course I said, you know, there were so few people getting pornographic tattoos before, before me and, and sort of these other artists I mentioned, um, which is of course, uh, just proved not true at all. People have always been amazing filthy perverts who love sex.

Eddy: Oh Yeah. Absolutely.

Onnie: And if you look back through newspaper records, you can find an article from almost every decade from the 1910s until today saying how tattooing is not underground anymore. Now it's becoming mainstream and it's not just for sailors of criminals. Every 10 years they bring this article out. It just makes me laugh because of course, I guess it's always been a little bit mainstream and a little bit subversive. And when, and it's, it's such a personal art form, so you don't have the same kind of control, let's say, um, is evident in, uh, like fine art, but you have gallery owners and curators and they, they can very specifically control who they, they think should be popular and, and whose work is going to be um, expensive, um, tattooing, you know, you're always dealing with sort of one on one clients. So while there is like a very, in, in all facets of society, very strong ideas about what is normal and acceptable. Uh, you get to meet some amazing people who have fantastic ideas outside of that, about, um, you know, what they like, what they want to decorate their body with. Um, and it's been such a privilege to. Have so many great clients. Who've shared so much with me about their, you know, their sexual experiences, um, their orientations. I am constantly surprised by how normal people look and the wild ass stories that they tell me.

Eddy: That's like, that's, that's one of the best parts of it. Like the stories you hear. In this journey while you're traveling, tattooing and like the shit you see in the stuf you hear.

Onnie: It's wild. Yeah. And I'm really, that's something that I miss so much right now is traveling and I can't wait to get overseas again, really, really excited about getting to do more traveling. And

Eddy: You've always been a big traveler hey?

Onnie: Yeah. Yeah. And my, um, you know, my mum has always been a big traveler as well. And, uh, you know, she's from Canada. So she moved over to Australia and then never left. So, I mean, I haven't, I just keep coming back to Australia. Like, I don't know. Maybe I should find some other country to live in for awhile.

Eddy: You'll come back.

Onnie: Yeah. I mean, I do love it here. I probably will always come back and we are very, very fortunate here as much as I rail against the government. Um, and send them a lot of, I've been sending Scott Morrison memes every time I see a real sassy one, I just email it to him. And even though, uh, I don't think he personally is receiving them. I'm hoping that I'm like slowly converting his staff.

Eddy: Yeah. They're probably all just being like, Oh wait, he is a joke. No, my favorite ones are all the Scotty no, from Austin Powers.

Onnie: Oh, my God. I haven't seen any of those.

Eddy: Ok, I will send them to you. Yes.

Onnie: We'll put them up on the screen.

Eddy: Yeah. It's yeah, we, we have like a lot of other patriarchal colonial countries. We have absolute bullshit dick wads in charge, but you know, Maybe we can burn them down and start a new one day.

Onnie: I'm going to continue to accept the welfare money that I contributed an enormous amount of tax towards.

Eddy: Damn right.

Onnie: And yeah.

Eddy: I paid tax. I'm taking that welfare.

Onnie: Exactly. That's exactly it. It's just funny that I gave you guys recently anyway.

Eddy: And I want everyone else taking that welfare too. Even if they didn't pay tax because you deserve it cause you're a human.

Onnie: Well, exactly. That's, you know, we live in a society, right?

Eddy: We've got to abide by their silly laws. They should fucking pay us.

Onnie: Totally totally well that's, I mean, it's, you know, it's a cycle it's, um, it has to be a cycle. So yeah, I mean, I hope, I hope people are doing really well. And I just wish so deeply that, um, everyone had the same kind of luxuries that we do at the moment. Um, yeah, so, and in the meantime, hopefully a nice comic book will help people.

Eddy: Definitely.

Onnie: Even if it's just some form of escapism for a short time.

Eddy: I think that's, yeah. It's, it's those little, those little moments where we can escape that will get people through it. For sure.

Onnie: Yeah. Yeah. And it's important. It's important to have a rest from the crushing existential horror

Eddy: Stop start worrying about when you can go back to tattooing and have a wank.

Onnie: That's it. That's it.

Eddy: Well.

Onnie: Um, Yeah, I was going to say, I think I have to head off.

Eddy: That's all right. Is there anything you wanted to mention before we finish up?

Onnie: I think I've pretty much covered everything. Uh, I'll give you the TLD address and, uh, send you through a bunch of cool memes um, for you and everyone else to laugh at.

Eddy: Well I'll post, for our listeners, I'll post a bunch of pictures and links, um, for the things that we've discussed, um, in our blog. Um, I'll also put links in the show notes and, um, yeah, you'll be able to listen to the episode on Spotify and iTunes and a few other channels. Um, Yeah, make sure you subscribe follow and share and help spread the love of tattooing. Um, thank you so much Onnie for sharing your story and to all our listeners for tuning in. We really appreciate it. I hope you all have a brilliant day and remember to love the heck out of yourself.

Onnie: Yeah, awesome, all right. So nice talking to you.

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oliverphisher · 4 years

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Rowena Holloway

You can find out more about Rowena at rowenahollowaynovels.com.

What are one to three books that have greatly influenced your life?

Oh, so many books! My top three would be Sophie’s World by Jostein Gaarder, Caught In The Light by Robert Goddard, and A Dark-Adapted Eye by Barbara Vine.

What purchase of $100 or less has most positively impacted your life in the last six months (or in recent memory)?

Failure—however we define it for ourselves—set me up to be more resilient and to persevere.

I actually wrote the better part of my Ashes To Ashes psychological thriller series that way. Books one and two were mostly written in waiting rooms or nearby coffee shops.

What is an unusual habit or an absurd thing that you love?

Anyway, singing to my dog is better than cursing the bullies, which is what I used to do on my walks. In the last five years, what new belief, behaviour, or habit has most improved your life?

Daily walking! It’s helped me get fit and kept me sane.

I’ve walked daily for years and now I get to enjoy with Alfie, who makes me laugh every day. It also gets me out in the sunshine (and rain) and I’ve met many people who have become friends.

And perhaps, now I think about it, it also feeds that belief that everything will be okay once you take a breather.

What advice would you give to a smart, driven aspiring author? What advice should they ignore?

Great question! The hardest lesson to learn—in life and especially as author—is knowing which advice to follow and which to ignore.

What are bad recommendations you hear in your profession often?

Avoid anyone who promises to have the magic bullet.

What new realizations and/or approaches have helped you achieve your goals?

There is an old song that has been running through my head and the chorus goes: “Pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and start all over again.”

You can’t get much better advice than that.

And don’t forget to enjoy it!

When you feel overwhelmed or have lost your focus temporarily, what do you do?

________

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