No More Makeup!

I don't wear makeup anymore. Well, that's not true. I still wear eyebrow pencil everyday. And I still line my lids everyday. And I still use mascara everyday, except on weekends. Those concessions to conventionality are to enhance my eyes and draw attention to heart of what I'm saying.

Finally, I absolutely must use lipstick or else it seems my face simply pales. Again, this is not for mere cosmetic value. The lipstick also accentuates my mouth so that what I'm saying is the focal point.

But I no longer use the blush and foundation and powder and creams and smoothers and all that other gunk. It was difficult trying to decide whether to do a full eyelid palette of one-color shadow or to use two or three colors. Where to put the multicolored adornment was also tricky. Blend in the middle? Use colors that don't clash but complement the outfit? Apply sparingly enough that you don't look like a blue-light hooker but enough that you have a slightly mysterious look? What a bother; what a time consumer. Fifteen minutes devoted to just the eyes.

Where to put the blush and how far up the cheek or close to the nose should it go? Is this color the right shade to give my face color or is it too much? Those were always the questions I asked myself both in the store and after the ochre was applied.

Then one day I made a discovery, quite by accident you know. I looked in the mirror after brushing my teeth. Lo and behold, my cheeks had a natural blush in the right places.

That's it! No more blush! I'm just wearing me.

Foundation was always a problem, too. No matter how sparingly applied and no matter how much powder, it still transferred onto sheets of paper as the day wore on or else onto shirt collars when I gave a welcoming hug or else onto dresses or blouses as I absent-mindedly touched them after also absent-mindedly touching my face anywhere. Books, magazines and letters wore my mark. Clients remembered me whenever they reviewed their closing documents. And then there were all those pimples caused by clogging from oily cream topped by layers of powder and powdery blush. Those are no longer a problem because I don't wear makeup anymore.

I don't wear girdles and panty girdles anymore either. Those abdominal tourniquets went away from me along with the '60s and '70s. I breathe when I want now. Actually, I put the last one in the trash in 1999 and almost abandoned them in 1994 when an unyielding force quite simply would not yield to the strictures, thus preventing me from breathing. What did those things really support or prevent from jiggling? Was it all that important after all? I don't think so. Whatever they did or did not do, I don't wear girdles anymore.

Likewise, I don't report to anyone about where I've gone anymore nor do I ask permission to associate with people. I don't make excuses for being online or talking on the phone. I'm no longer ashamed for being angry when my privacy is invaded. I'm not crippled by fear that I won't be liked if I express myself, tactfully, regarding my opinions, interpretations, desires, beliefs.

I'm free to express my personal boundaries and ask that they be respected. It's okay to feel a need to grow beyond being a servant. It's all right to desire stretch in order to reach a fuller capacity and fuller, if not full, employment.

No longer is there guilt at recognizing a subterfuge and avoiding it. No need to excuse it as accidental misinterpretation and mistaken goodwill. Evil intent is evil intent. That second voice tells you when you need to take care of yourself and it comes from the most basic of protection systems that is truest -- self-preservation.

All of my old friends, reference books, are gone. They're no longer crutches that bend and bow from heavy reliance. Instead, I stand strong and firm and assured of myself because now I know that I didn't need to waste those hours checking and triple checking myself. I knew the information all along. I simply needed to trust myself.

I learned to speak up for myself - before I got angry. And I enjoyed the sweet taste of victory when the person addressed responded positively. There was no great cost. I have the tools to make good decisions. Now I have the power to trust in doing so; I have the power to trust the decisions to speak in good time.

Speaking in time has given me a new freedom as well -- true freedom to choose and recognize what the choices are.

I'm free. Not completely, but more unfettered now than at age ten.

Yes, he looked at me in an admiring way a second, and even a third, time. Maybe I'll ask him for some information. He probably knows the answer. Then I'll know the answer.

I don't blow dry my hair or hot curl it anymore. No time. There's too much to be done to mess with those time-consuming issues that change the look and feel for a day, sometimes less. How fickle Nature is. It will allow a hairdo for as long as the wind does not blow, the fog does not compress or frizz, the heat does not sweat away. No need to bother with that stuff anymore. Pixie cuts are the rage. With just the right sized earrings and the right amount of eye makeup and lipstick, you're still a woman, but a free woman.

Oh, my God, what a life!

I don't wear makeup anymore.