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Back in my college days I found myself at a loss for what to do for a career. I went to my local employment office to consult the job postings and after lengthy perusal of the positions available I decided that being a fry cook or an insurance agent were probably not for me. It had always been a deep desire to be able to express myself through my work and stocking shelves was not going to do it for me.

I had been keeping a sketch book of ideas with me that I would often doodle in during my anthropology class between taking notes and gazing at the girl four rows ahead of me. Would you believe that after writing her name "Skylar" over and over again in Cyrillic inspired script snaking around a bleeding rose, I began to have an idea that I may be destined for a dynamic career in my local ink palace.

I kept my sketches and worked assiduously at furthering my skills in line and shading using an old ball point pen I carried around with me in a red pencil box. Over the course of six terms at school I had amassed quite a volume of small, finely rendered pieces that I was rather proud of. After screwing up my courage one day by staring in the mirror repeating affirmations like "I can do it" and "quitting is for quitters" and “only the good die young" I was sufficiently pumped to catch the bus downtown.

I marched into the first shop I found and asked to talk with the owner. When she presented herself, I stammered out that I wanted to show her my sketches with a view to becoming an artist. She was very supportive and gave me some great pointers like "it's better not to combine puppies and shotguns in the same piece.

After some time of this, she suggested that I come back when I had gained some experience more relevant to the position. I left downtrodden but emboldened and simply walked half way down the block to the next establishment. When I showed my sketches to the next owner, he simply grunted and pointed his thumb at the restroom where I spent the next half hour earning my interview by scrubbing and cleaning. In what can only be described as a rough, hard-knock apprenticeship characterized by menial cleaning tasks and fetching coffee for the established artists and the owner, I finally was granted the chance to put my work in real ink by tattooing the left butt cheek of a first timer with his boyfriend's name: "Jeff."

Wonder upon wonder, I eventually became what I am today. Tenacity paid off and excellence was achieved.

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