Tammy O’Connor (left) and her daughter, Megan, concurrently pierce the ears Thursday of Coe School freshman Sangai Dukuly at Wildside Tattoo and Physique Piercing in Cedar Rapids. (Geoff Stellfox/The Gazette)
Tammy O’Connor and her daughter, Megan, concurrently pierce the ears of Coe School freshman Sangai Dukuly on Thursday at Wildside Tattoo and Physique Piercing in Cedar Rapids. (Geoff Stellfox/The Gazette)
Megan Valentine-O’Connor (left) and her mom, Tammy, pose for a portrait Thursday at Wildside Tattoo and Physique Piercing in Cedar Rapids. (Geoff Stellfox/The Gazette)
Megan Valentine-O’Connor exhibits off her tattoo portraits of her mom, Tammy, and father, Johnny. on Thursday at Wildside Tattoo and Physique Piercing in Cedar Rapids. (Geoff Stellfox/The Gazette)
Megan Valentine-O’Connor performs a tongue piercing Thursday on Aaminah Dishman at Wildside Tattoo and Physique Piercing in Cedar Rapids. (Geoff Stellfox/The Gazette)
Megan Valentine-O’Connor pierces the ear Thursday of Coe School freshman Alexis Perdomo at Wildside Tattoo and Physique Piercing in Cedar Rapids. (Geoff Stellfox/The Gazette)
Tons of of piercing choices are on show for potential clients at Wildside Tattoo and Physique Piercing in Cedar Rapids. (Geoff Stellfox/The Gazette)
Coe School sophomore Morgana Goodlow provides the thumbs-up to associates Thursday whereas getting her ear pierced at Wildside Tattoo and Physique Piercing in Cedar Rapids. (Geoff Stellfox/The Gazette)
CEDAR RAPIDS — Elevating a lady is difficult.
Tammy O’Connor, 51, makes that remark as she watches her daughter, Megan Valentine-O’Connor, 31, pierce the tongue of a buyer at Wildside Tattoo and Physique Piercing in Cedar Rapids.
“At one time, she had 52 piercings,” Tammy says of Megan.
“Truly, I used to be at 70 at one level,” Megan admits.
“Typically as mothers we don’t know all the things,” Tammy laughs, her face in actual life wanting just like the tattoo of her face on the again of Megan’s proper hand. Johnny O’Connor, Megan’s dad and Tammy’s husband, is smiling up from the again of Megan’s left hand.
From Megan’s 16-year-old summer time when she moved to Nashville to reside with an uncle after preventing together with her mother a couple of secret tongue piercing till right now, when Megan, Tammy and Johnny work collectively to run Wildside, one of the Corridor’s top tattoo and body piercing studios, it’s been a wild trip.
The insurgent daughter who got here residence to affix the household enterprise says she wanted far to see issues from her mother’s viewpoint.
“I don’t go a day with out speaking to my mother now,” Megan says. “So to assume I went 2 1/2 months with out speaking to her was loopy. However, like I stated, I used to be a younger, dumb teenager.”
Occasions change
When Tammy was rising up, the one folks in her household with tattoos have been her uncles, who had been within the army. She had her ears pierced as a younger lady, however didn’t take into consideration including piercings or ink, which could have been a hurdle as a nurse within the Nineties.
Then she met Johnny, an iron employee with a full set of tats.
“I didn’t inform my mother and father for a minute as a result of he didn’t match how I used to be raised,” Tammy says.
Her mother and father finally met Johnny and favored him, which is nice as a result of Tammy and Johnny bought married and opened Wildside Tattoos, first in Mount Vernon, in 1998. The couple relocated their enterprise to Cedar Rapids in 2006.
Tammy bought her first tattoo — a palm tree in entrance of the ocean and setting solar — when she was 30. Megan was about 10 when she noticed the ink on Tammy’s decrease again when her mother bent to get one thing from the fridge.
“She was like, ‘Mother! What’s that?’” Tammy says.
“The truth that she didn’t inform me about it, I questioned her,” Megan says.
Discovering her path
Megan’s first “actual” piercing — not one thing you get on the mall — was her tragus, the tiny flap of ear closest to your cheek. She was in sixth grade and had her mother and father’ blessing.
She carried out her first piercing on another person when she was 17, below Johnny’s supervision.
“In the future she pierced someone and it was good,” Tammy says.
That started Megan’s profession as a physique piercer, but it surely took many extra years to be snug with the commerce. She’s now generally known as being quick, pleasant {and professional} — easing clients’ nerves by calling them “hon” and telling them explicitly how you can hold their new holes from getting contaminated.
Her abilities have been on show Thursday, when members of the Coe College Track and Field workforce got here in to get piercings.
“Can I get each ears?” Sangai Dukuly, 18, asks.
No drawback. Tammy steps in to pierce Dukuly’s left helix, the again ridge of the ear, whereas Megan does the precise. It’s over in seconds and one other younger lady hops onto a raised leather-based chair within the middle of the tattoo parlor.
Piercing is sizzling proper now, with the most well-liked elements to pierce being the septum — cartilage that separates the nostrils — and stomach button, Megan says. She’s one of many solely skilled physique piercers on the town to do kids 10 weeks and older.
“I’ve had many mother and father who are available and say I’m successful on the mommy web page on Fb,” she stated. “Lots of people take pleasure in watching what I do.”
Mutual respect
Tammy loves seeing her daughter come into her personal. Not solely do they work effectively collectively, however the mom and daughter like to buy on the Buckle — “Megan has higher style, so I’m going with what she says,” Tammy says — and choose up sushi for lunch.
Megan made Italian tacos for Tammy’s birthday final month.
For Mom’s Day, they’re planning a household gathering to have a good time the third birthday of dual nephews and grandsons. Tammy stated she additionally will convey lunch and an orchid plant to her personal mom, Mary Flack, of Cedar Rapids.
“For Mom’s Day, I do plan to be together with her,” Megan stated of Tammy. “Both to take her to dinner or most likely cook dinner dinner once more.”
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