Popination Inoculation
a series of unhinged personal essays disguised as pub reviews. Today: Twisted Pine. Or is that Rising Tide?
INTRO: I have a Very Special Xmas post about a Very Special Holiday Popination, which will go up next Monday after my winter holiday shenanigans are somewhat concluded. Here on Boxing Day, then, please to enjoy this Popination from a few weeks ago, and its connected reflection on body art from years past. The Xmas Popination of which I speak will arrive on New Years Day. Cheers.
One of the most recent times I was at this brewery was a couple summers ago, just before I went off to Olympia to do Shakespeare. I had just gotten the final 3-hour session completed on my big detailed sleeve tattoo. The fresh wound felt vibrant and hot and it slimed the inside of the plastic wrap that served as a protective bandage, masking-taped around my arm.
I walked into the front area of the brewery to place my order, and the staff admired the freshly wrapped art. They must get lots of freshly tattooed people coming in here to get a pint and relax and try to quit vibrating. I imagine so because Twisted Pine is right around the corner from multiple Best of Boulder gold award winning tattoo shop, Rising Tide.
Rising Tide
And now, a brief history of my tattoos:
Back in 1996, just before artistic tattoos became a trendy wave in Colorado, I went to Bolder Ink studio in Boulder and got a rendition of a beautiful little metal Pisces fish pendant my boyfriend had gotten me, inked onto my right shoulder blade. This was a ballsy move at that time and place, as this was something I had wanted to do for a long time but hadn’t had the guts till now. It was just before I was about to graduate with two degrees at CU-Boulder, and I guess I was feeling more punk than ever. At that time, I chose a place that could easily be covered up, and when I began to get cast it was a huge deal that I was tattooed, even this small pretty thing on a shoulder blade.
At the time I had gotten this first tattoo, I was working at the CO Shakespeare Festival, and as such, was living in the apartments that housed all the artists that came together each summer to put on the shows. This was, as you might imagine, an intensive party atmosphere, and since I lived with a few other people of high charisma, and was already a seasoned drama school drinker in my own right, most of the parties ended up at my apartment (I was also a skilled home bartender). Once, the phenomenal actor that played Hamlet that summer was prowling around the party, a full bottle of tequila (I think? Or was it vodka) dangling from his hand. I asked him how it was he was able to drink like that and yet act such a difficult role so well? He looked down at me (he was quite tall), replied, “Like this:” and took a huge swig from his bottle. Then he walked away.
One of the other parties at this time was the evening of my tattoo. I unveiled the bandage at the party, and then a friend and fellow actor of mine took one look, and bit the whole thing with his vodka-soaked teeth. I railed against him, thinking sincerely that it could have been ruined by such a thing, and he was both hilariously and truly sorry. It turned out fine, needless to say.
In 2001, I had just graduated with my MFA, and was now working full time as a kids’ gymnastics teacher. It was a decent job, had minimal benefits, and I was in full martial arts training mode. I had dropped out of both the aerial dance company and the swordfighting group not long before, got married, and now was working alongside my new husband on all these challenging physical works. I had also just begun teaching as an adjunct at one university, and was about to add classes from another to my roster, and so thought why not do that only as my job? The kids were a series of petri dishes that caused me several illnesses, one actually dangerous enough that my tonsils closed off my throat. And after all, I can work as an adjunct for a while and then much more easily get a tenured professor position, right? Right? …sigh.
Just before I quit the gymnastics gig, I planned and designed and took the funds to get a thick armband done all in Celtic knotwork on my left forearm.I went to Bolder Ink for this one, too: I walked into the shop, looked around, and asked the men there, “Which one of you does Celtic knotwork?” They all pointed as one at Phil.* It lands right at the top of my forearm, so it’s right below where most (short) sleeves land. As I began my college professor career, it was an oddly subtle sign of my coolness–even though the artistic tattoo trend was in full swing, it was still very not mainstream, still thought of as a punk or subversive thing to have.
*I learned later that Phil was the resident n00b, and so I imagine that the veteran artists all gave it to him as a sort of hazing. I can’t imagine that inches of Celtic knotwork is at all easy to render on skin.
In a very raw place, just post-divorce, living alone for the first time, and beginning my foray into the arts of burlesque, I was also at the rocky beginning of my relationship with my partner. One Halloween, I wanted to do a thing that honored the thinning of the veil, and so I asked a fellow burlesquer if she would do an in-house piece for me. She was a practitioner of the stick-and-poke type of tattooing, the ancient type where there’s one needle, not many, and it’s a manual process: one stab at a time. I found a beautiful design by Leonard Cohen, called ‘The Order of the Unified Heart,’ and I had her place it just over my heart. She smudged us with sage and led us in meditation just before, and I sipped on red wine during the process. It was remarkably the least painful tattoo I’ve endured, which was surprising to me.
My birthday in 2019 arrived just before the pandemic. As a lovely present, my partner designed and funded a big beautiful old fashioned style tattoo that involves a sword, 5 roses, and banners on which are the immortal words: “Mad, bad, and dangerous to know.” I went to Rising Tide for this one for the first time, and was delighted at the quality of the work. Then again, the artist did have a perfect design to work from. That afternoon, I felt oddly sick, unlike I had before. I was okay after a day or two, but. Huh. Weird. Wonder what that was all about. But right after the tattoo was done (it took about 3 hours), I went over to Twisted Pine for a pint before bussing and light-railing the long trip back to my partner’s place.
My biggest, baddest, beautifulest tattoo was a coverup of one I’d rather not talk about (I covered it up for several reasons, let’s just leave it at that). It consisted of 4 sessions of 3 hours each: lines, shading, color phase 1, and color phase 2. Then a session of touchups. It’s a Japanese style carp, swimming amid peonies. There’s beautiful dark backgrounds and layers of texture and color. The fish is mainly pink, because of the quote from Sherlock Holmes:
The fish that you have tattooed immediately above your right wrist could only have been done in China. I have made a small study of tattoo marks, and have even contributed to the literature of the subject. That trick of staining the fish’s scales of a delicate pink is quite peculiar to China…
But Twisted Pine, tho!
Obviously they don’t serve alcohol at Rising Tide, and so let’s get to the actual Popination, shall we? It’s about the famous beers of Twisted Pine, though they’re actually a bit less ubiquitous these days. Twisted Pine is the last bastion of the OG Boulder beers, since Boulder Beer’s demise. You could potentially count Mountain Sun in this, too, but you can’t get Mountain Sun pints anywhere except in the pubs themselves. And Oskar Blues is more of a Longmont or Lyons institution than a Boulder. So Twisted Pine is really the last of the Boulder breweries, especially after the pandemic’s decimations. My favorite beer of theirs is a very snappy IPA called Hoppy Boy, but they have a lot of tasty and interesting choices that are locally famous, especially their super-popular spicy brews called Billie’s Chilies, Ghost-Face Killah, and such. These beers are deliciously infused with all kinds of locally grown peppers, like Hatch chilies and ghost peppers and the like. Boulderites do love their peppers, so I can see why those are so popular, but I usually can’t do more than a taster of those, yummy as they are.
Since Covid protocols, Twisted Pine has adopted (and not stopped) a sort of cafeteria style service that isn’t table service, but more like a school cafeteria or a very old diner. You go to the front counter and make your order, paying right there. They’ll pour your pint and then give you a little beeper device if you order food. Then you go wherever you want to sit & sip while you wait.
They have a back room, too, but I don’t know if it’s used for anything anymore—each time I’ve been there it’s been empty. They used to have frequent live music events there, and one of the earliest Blue Dime Cabaret promo events was there too, back in the Before Times. But then again, I’m so rarely anywhere in Boulder in the evenings anymore, so. It’s hard to know if anything is the same there, even though the beers taste like they always have. Ordering them is different. Remember I don’t do research for these pieces usually, so I’m not going to go look up if they have events back there anymore but I can’t imagine they’d still be able to stay in business if they didn’t–it’s a big space. Though it is in an out-of-the-way place, not like it’s on the historic Pearl Street Mall or something like that. But still.
Twisted Pine is tucked away in a parking lot and an office park, so isn't really a frequent popination for me anymore, even when I’m in Boulder. I mean, unless I get another tattoo. This latest time I popinated in there because I was meeting my co-producer of BDC at her gym to cast our February variety show. Back in the day, we’d cast every show together at her architecture office over wine & cheese. Just post-pandemic, we changed it up so that I would do the casting myself and she would take care of the payout. So we hadn’t actually cast a show together in some time—it was very cool, to do it sort of like we used to. Obviously no wine & cheese, but. I dunno. Not really the same, though.
Is it the end of an era? Or just a different era? Twisted Pine isn’t the same, either, but then neither are we. Neither is anybody. I guess time and tide and disease and art have all left their tattoos on us, and that’s okay. And who knows what the next indelible image will be. Time will tell.
