NEIGHBORS

Bad Billie, as she is known around town, owns Billie’s Skin Gallery/ Healdsburg Ink at 311 Center Street, across from the Flying Goat. She works there along with Adam Burns and their apprentice, Brandon McDonald.
While Mack the Knife is playing in the background and both Billie and Adam are painting their customers, Billie tells me a bit of her story.
“I grew up in Healdsburg and went to school here, loving my art teacher, Mr. Lopez. I wanted to be an artist –– perhaps for Disney––but in the 1980s, I didn’t even know what a tattoo was.
“I was working as a sign painter in Novato, and felt discouraged. Then, in 1986-87, someone suggested I be a tattoo artist, which I thought sounded weird. At that time, it was kinda ‘No girls allowed.’ Then my dear friend Uncle Mark said that Bert Rodriquez was looking for an apprentice in Santa Rosa. I met Bert, who hired me on the spot. ‘Billie, do this… Billie, get a coffee…’ he’d say, while he taught me. And I got a lot of coffee!
“I worked for many people over the next 20 years, mostly in Vallejo and San Francisco. I love the art, the people and the money. I think of my work as original art plagiarized from God.”
As Billie works on her customer, Andrea Rochioli, I ask what she’s doing.
“Andrea had some work done by someone else and it needed some sparkle,” Billie replies. “Guys need help with flowers …”
Overhearing, Adam jokes: “My goal in life is to never do a man flower.”
“When a customer wants something original, we ask a lot of questions,” Billie tells me. “We want to know their astrological sign and some things that they love. Sometimes people want something which seems contradictory to their nature. It can be a hard sale to convince them otherwise.”
“If someone comes in with a crummy tattoo, I cover it up with something really pretty,” she adds. “Andrea came in to have color added to her tattoo.”
“I’ve come in and flipped through the books before,” Andrea tells me. “People around town spoke well of Billie’s style and everyone has heard of Bad Billie in Healdsburg.”
“I do seem to be known everywhere,” Billie continues. “Once I wandered into a little tattoo shop in New York City. They didn’t know who I was, but they were talking about me there. I’ve won awards and am a member of the National Tattoo Association, which has only 1,000 members worldwide.”
“Good news travels fast in the tattoo world!” Andrea adds.
Billie goes on to tell us that when she was working in San Francisco, she did some pretty unusual interviews because she was a woman in a male dominated profession. She even appeared on Evening Magazine with Connie Chung and still likes to joke about Connie standing on a stool.
After about 20 years as a tattoo artist, Billie opened shop in Healdsburg 10 years ago.
“I worked with a guy in Vallejo for four years, but it became too stressful for me. I’m so lucky to be here by the skin of my teeth, as it wasn’t easy getting into Healdsburg without zoning for a tattoo parlor. But the City and the Planning Commissioners were great. I opened on my own and practically broke my back changing the paint color in this former massage parlor from bright red and sponged pink.”
Shortly after Billie opened, Adam Burns dared to come by and work up the courage to ask for a job.
“I moved here from Humboldt County when I was in junior high,” Adam tells me. “Mom — whose name you won’t believe — is Candy Cane, called me her ’40-year-old midget’ when I was six, drawing and selling portraits at crafts fairs while she and Grandma sold things of their own. I had my own booth, which I paid for. When we moved to Healdsburg, I worked in her candy store for 17 years. I stirred caramel for 4 and a half hours at a time and ended up only liking the English toffee that I made myself. When a candy store in Ft. Bragg closed, Mom went and got all their candy recipes while I sat outside drawing the main street all day.
“After that, I did many other jobs, but then said to myself, ‘Dude, you’re getting old and you need a career where you can draw all day long!’ I’d come to Billie’s place with friends, but didn’t have a tattoo and hid in a corner. Then one day, Billie saw me at the Goat and invited me to come talk sometime. ‘How about now?’ I asked.”
“He looked interesting and I like characters who amuse me,” Billie jokes. “I made him draw a tiny design and do it perfectly. He was so nervous!”
“And I asked, ‘Ummm… hypothetically, if someone wanted to be a tattoo artist, how would they go about it?’
“Thus, I began my apprenticeship,” Adam says, “starting at the bottom, learning on the job. One day I went to get something to eat, came back and Billie said, ‘Get ready, Dude, you’re painting a Chinese dragon on the meat department guy from Big John’s.’ I had an out of body experience, but it turned out great. I had no tattoos for 10 years until she tattooed my nuts. I’ve had some pretty powerful reactions when I offer to show someone my nuts!”
While Adam continues tattooing a gorgeous Our Lady of Guadalupe on the arm of Rafael Gonzales, a Fetzer employee who came from Mendocino County, I move my chair over to apprentice Brandon McDonald from Forestville, who has remained in the background up till now.
“I was a bored dishwasher who got a lucky break because one of my co-workers knew Adam,” Brandon says. “I’ve been working on people about a year and wouldn’t want to work for anyone else. They’re the best.”
And to this, Adam adds, “Billie wants us to do good work here. I’d never be working as a tattoo artist if not for her. She gave me a career.”
“There’s no crap here,” Billie tells us all. “No superstars.” And there’s only one thing that award-winning Billie maybe wishes she’d done.
“I was going to paint the Sistine Chapel on my ceiling and put all the faces of the Healdsburg Planning Commission on it.”
Shonnie Brown is a local author and memoirist who is interested in fostering connections between people and their community. Shonnie writes personal and family histories through her business, Sonoma LifeStories, and is also a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist. She can be reached by e-mail at sh*****@so***.net or on the web at www.sonomalifestories.com.