Ink 🗞️ Slow News Day #36

Hey,

I’ve been getting tattoos since I was 18, but it's ramped up a bit over the last couple of years. I’ve been building out a collection of brushwork British botanicals on my right arm.

During Lockdown 2, I took a daily walk through Higher Cemetery back in Exeter. It’s massive and full of beautiful planting and old trees. I’d watch the resident pair of Jays swoop low under branches and let squirrels take food out of my outstretched palm. Bucolic peace in unsettled times.

There's a ginkgo tree there. It stands out — yellow leaves in a sea of green — and the more I learned about ginkgos, the more I loved them. They’re considered ‘living fossils’, as one of the oldest living species in the world, and predate dinosaurs. And there it was, in that moment, reaching out and dropping leaves at my feet in my tiny sliver of the modern world. Magic.

As chance would have it, I was looking through Sophie Mahadevan’s flash book on Instagram and saw a ginkgo leaf. The ginkgo leaf.

Since then, we’ve been filling up my arm with rowan branches, ferns, acorns, mushrooms (more Psathyrella Incerta than Psilocybin… I swear), and oats. On Monday, we added willow. A big 'orrible bastard of a willow. By far the biggest tattoo I’ve had so far.

It falls down my shoulder and wraps around my bicep and it looks great… and it’s the first tattoo I’ve got that’s ever really hurt. After about three hours, I felt fine mentally but my nervous system wasn’t having a great time and I started shaking involuntarily. Not ideal when getting a permanent design drilled into your flesh.

Sophie stepped back and asked me to take a break. I was kind of confused, as I’d never really needed to before and felt fine. But she encouraged me — gently yet firmly — and helped me get through to the end.

When I thanked her later on, she gave a reply that’s stuck with me:

never be afraid to ask for a break when you need it !

Worth remembering—and not just for when I’m under the needle.

I hope you remember it too, next time you need it.

Slow down guide

Need a little help moving slower?

Ease your way out of Friday afternoon with this newsletter, a nice cup of something, and a little background music. Steal my setup if you aren't sure where to start.

After I press send, I’m going to be drinking some batch brew from Espressini. We arrived in Falmouth on Wednesday, our home for the next month. As luck would have it, the nearest coffee shop has got Yallah Coffee’s La Cabana on tap at the moment. I’d be silly not to indulge and I think you’d do well to treat yourself to a cup, as well.

And for this week’s musical accompaniment, Barbara Ann by Rosie Tucker deserves your attention. Don’t worry, it’s not a Beach Boys cover. Their voice is ridiculous and they use it in some really fun ways — with and against the other instruments. They bounce through the chorus against grumbling, reverb-thick guitar. They soar through the bridge with its dawdling, spacey synths. They roll against the sharp, punchy drums in the verses. Beautiful stuff.

Take it easy,