Cream. Lotion. Lipstick. Waxing. Fingernails. Toenails. Hair. Stilettos. Make-up. Cellulite solutions. Breast enhancements. Tummy tucks. Eyebrows. Push-up bras. Facials. If I'm aware of this many feminine fixations, it means that real women are aware of a whole lot more.
It's finally hot in Italy, so the other day I left home a bit less covered than usual. My skirt was shorter, my neckline was lower and I didn't have sleeves. This got me so much attention I thought maybe I'd put my shirt on backwards and the v was exposing my belly button. I even looked down to double check that I was wearing a skirt, but everything was in place.
It started when I crossed in front of a car on my bike. I saw that it was the owner of the bar where I've been parking lately, so I smiled. Every time I've locked my bike there I've wondered if it bothered him, so pulling up to the spot while he was still in sight made me a bit uncomfortable. Then he said something that I didn't understand. After two
"Scusi, non ho capitos", I went to his window. He repeated for the third time that he hoped having a beautiful woman pass in front of him and smile would be a sign of good luck for the rest of the day. (I guess I can stop worrying about my new parking spot.)
That's when I realized that I have nothing to flaunt but my smile. My bra size is 34A. The only thing smaller is 32A. The 34 part just means I'm a little girthier than I used to be. I don't use lotion or foundation or wrinkle cream. I wash my face with a bar of Ivory soap and if I run out I dig around in my junk drawer until I find a little bar wrapped in plastic that I brought home from some cheap hotel. I use the same three beauty products at 51 that I used at 15--the pink and green brand of mascara, a little plastic case of blush that breaks the first time you drop it and lip stuff. The only other thing I do to enhance my beauty is run. So what I save on make-up I spend on running shoes.
One of my students is a cute, 28-year old blonde. She's recently started going to the gym which led to a fresh new topic for her English lesson. I was surprised to hear that she wears knee-length leggings and a short-sleeved t-shirt in the un-airconditioned gym in June. Her reason is that she doesn't like the men in the gym to look at her, which led to the next question. Didn't she think working out was going to make her look even better (in and out of the gym) which would garner even more unwanted attention? She agreed that it might be true, but claimed that she's only working out to look better for herself and no one else.
That's when I started asking other women about their motives for beautification. All of them told me that they do it for themselves. And I told all of them that I don't think they're telling the truth. I'll be the first (and maybe only) to admit that though I don't do much, the little that I do is for more than my eyes only. I find it hard to believe that Cosmo and Elle readers go to the lengths they do with no hopes of being noticed.
Let's talk waxing. In Italy, I don't have any friends that don't wax their legs. And it seems that age 16 isn't too early to start. I know what it feels like right when you leave the esthetician's (a word I didn't know until I moved to Italy) because I've been demanded by friends to touch their legs. They feel as smooth as a chubby baby's leg. (And if you don't have a chubby baby around, just touch the fatty part of the palm of your hand.) But give it a week (I'll be generous and say 10 days) and the thrill is gone. And after two and a half weeks it's time to start wearing pants again, even if it's 90 degrees. Whenever I see a well-groomed women dressed in pants on a hot summer day I know she's in between expensive waxings.
When I suggest shaving every day and wearing summer clothes whenever you want to they all say, "But when you shave, the hair grows back dark and thick." To which I reply, "If you shave every day, you never know how it grows back." Sometimes I even reach the 36-hour mark and it's not as smooth as it was right after shaving, but at least I don't have to overdress for the next 12 days waiting to see my
estetista. And one lesson they all seem to learn at Italian beauty school is that fuzzy legs should be hidden and fuzzy armpits exposed.
Then there's the expensive electric muscle builder. Apparently you just plug it in and it works (so you don't have to). When I went for physical therapy after I broke my leg the therapist attached little pads to my thigh and then attached my little thigh (after 40 days in a cast it was a little thigh) to a machine and left the room. He said that if it was too uncomfortable I could call him. It was a little electric shock to stimulate muscle growth. I asked if I could please just do more squats. He said that if Italian women thought that way a lot of companies would go out of business. I find it hard to believe that women suffer these small doses of shock just for themselves with no hopes of an outside compliment.
Maybe I lost my stomach for beauty when I was a contestant in the 1982 Miss United Teenager Pageant. I loved my turquoise taffeta dress with puffy sleeves and the floor-length lacy white one. When I gave my speech on "What My Country Means to Me" I wore a knee-length red skirt and a white ruffled shirt with a little blue vest. Fortunately there was no swimsuit competition because at that time I was probably still too small for the 32A. I made it to the top 15 finalists and then I had a meltdown backstage. Someone was coming around with Vaseline to rub on your gums. As it was my first pageant I was unaware of the tricks of a real beauty queen. A swab of Vaseline on your gums gives you a permanent smile. That's when I lost my enthusiasm. What was I doing in a group of girls that couldn't just smile a natural smile when it was the right time to smile? Needless to say, I wasn't Miss United Teenager that year.
My father-in-law used to say that a chubby, bikini-clad girl on the beach was more attractive than a skinny one that put her shorts on to take a walk. Put a smile on the chubby one and she definitely takes the cake.
Girls are so busy hiding behind emoticons on their smart phones that they forget to look up and smile. Someone needs to send them a message that it's the cheapest and most effective beauty product on the market.
The End
The author wishes to express a few beauty truths that didn't come out in this piece.
1. She colors her hair because when her sick friend went to try on wigs she played along and tried a blond one. It brightened her cheeks so much she could almost stop spending money on the little breakable case of blush. So, she went blond and always asks the hairdresser to leave a piece of gray in the front to show who she really is.
2. She's gone from Bonnie Bell Lip Smackers to a long-lasting lipstick by Revlon. It costs 12 euro which is the most expensive beauty purchase on her list. She has recently discovered it's also the best sunblock for lips she's ever used and therefore justifies the price.
3. Having been struck by a board nearly 20 years ago she found herself lying flat on her stomach below a crew of onlooking construction workers shouting, "Don't move!" from the second storey. Her only response was, "I imagine this is a pretty good view of my cellulite." A week later she bought an expensive cellulite cream by Clarin's. According to her and many others, it worked. She didn't believe anything cured cellulite, but the product tightened the skin and made it seem more like ricotta than cottage cheese. The problem was, should she apply it before her morning run to look better while running and then wash it all away in the shower? Or after the run to look better on the beach for a few minutes until it washed away in the lake? In the end she decided she preferred the cellulite to the additional gray hair and wrinkles incurred by the stress of deciding the best time to use an expensive beauty product.
