Although the legal age for getting a tattoo is 18 in Michigan, some students have already gotten tattoos with a parent’s consent and have a meaning or story behind them.

     Tattoos have become more popular over the last few years. According to the Pew Research Center, in 2010 about 40 percent of Americans between 18 and 29 had at least one tattoo.

     While the permanence of tattoos may put some people off, to others it’s exactly what they’re looking for. Junior Marissa Orzame said her tattoo reminds her of a message about life.

     “I got a tattoo of an arrow on my wrist. It symbolizes when life gets tough and you feel like life is dragging you behind, eventually it is going to shoot you forward,” Orzame said. “Me, my mom and my brother all have a matching tattoo. It did take my dad some convincing, but he has ended up liking it.”

     Senior Myles Cummings said his body art serves as more of a reminder to himself.

     “I have had a very strange last couple of years,” Cummings said. “I have a tattoo with a third eye on it and the third eye kind of resembles opening my mind to new possibilities, other things.”

     Junior Janifer Johnson is also among the students who have tattoos. She said hers is in honor of her late cousin.

     “My cousin died this summer and there are ten cousins on my mom’s side of the family,” Johnson said. “We all have a number in what order we were born. For example, I am number six. She was number three, so all the cousins got a different version of the number three somewhere. My mom was really on board since it was her side of the family and it was also her goddaughter, but my dad wasn’t really a fan of it at the time.”

      Inked Magazine, a tattoo lifestyle periodical, reports that, “it’s a pretty well known fact that tattoos are going to hurt, and for the most part, there’s no way to eliminate all of the pain.” A mechanized needle punctures the skin and injects ink to apply tattoos.

     However, Orzame said that she did not find the process very painful.

     “It honestly did not hurt that bad and it only took like 15 minutes, but it depends on where you get it,” Orzame said. “After this one I want a lot more.”

     Other students also said they were interested in getting more body art.

     “I plan on getting another one soon, so I am looking forward to that,” Cummings said.

     According to Popular Science, since the skin is damaged when the tattoo is inked, the body responds by sending white blood cells to absorb the foreign particles and discard them into the bloodstream. But the ink’s pigment particles are too large to be broken down by white blood cells, so the tattoo remains intact. That’s why they are permanent.

     “Make sure you do a lot of research because you want to make sure that everything is sterilized and safe and spend time thinking about what you want because you do not want to regret it,” Johnson said.