Nerves on strike

Oddly enough (though I'm certainly not complaining) The Itching Time has passed me completely in the tattoo-healing process this time around. My snake is almost done with the first and most important and noticeable part of healing, where the dead top layer of skin peels away (or scabs and then peels away form some people, but not for me), and so far, nary so much as a twitch has come from the fresh new skin revealed.

Usually by this time I'm damn near mad with the desire to scratch the bejesus out of the newly inked skin, or hack of whatever hunk of flesh bears it, whichever would be faster. The itching of a healing tattoo isn't like a mosquito bite that itches cnstantly but generally dully so; it's a driving, needling, sharp and firey painful itch that strikes at random moments and leaves you desperate for relief. It makes you twitch and squirm and snarl and try to come up with as many ways as possible to scratch it without actually scratching the skin (I've found that a paper towel placed as a barrier between nails and skin works well.)

This time, though - nothing. I have not once suddenly gone rigid, with clenched teeth and bulging eyes. I haven't groaned piteously. I haven't leapt up from my chair and run to the lunch room for a paper towel, knocking down anyone and anything in my way. My nerves have been oddly quiet. I think they're on strike.

I think that the nearly five-and-a-half hours of constnt tattooing was too much for them, and now they're rebelling, refusing to tell my brain that my arm is really one firey, jabbing, throbbing mass of itchiness.

I'm not saying my arm is numb - the nerves aren't dead; I can feel everything in that arm perfectly well except itching.

Not that I'm complaining. In fact, I'm thrilled. I didn't throttle anyone this week; this is a good thing. It would be a completely different story had The Itching Time commenced as usual; Sarah is getting married next Monday and so has been out all week and David and I have had to scramble to make up for it (it figures than in six months of drudgingly slow work, the one week we're down a person is when all the big stuff comes pouring in.) I'm counting myself (and everyone around me) very lucky indeed.

Maybe getting so much work done that the part of my body being tattooed goes into a sort of shock is a good thing ...

Kidding. Sorta. I know, I know; shock is bad. But damn if it isn't ocnvenient at times, too.

Photos soon. Promise.