Finding Hope in Beauty Cream

Buying thimbles of cream even at outrageous prices is buying hope. If a cream can put one hour, one minute between me and the tragedy of the jawline wattle, I want it by the gallons.

When you reach a certain age, as the French so delicately put it, people are always telling you, “Oh, you look exactly the same, you haven’t changed a bit!’’ 

That’s when you need to run to the nearest dream-seller and get loaded up on anti-ageing everything. They lie to be kind or to reassure themselves, because they know that one day gravity will punish them for years of late nights, coffee and cigarettes. 

 On the inside, I feel like playing hopscotch. On the outside, however, it’s all about, “Oh, you’re looking good.’’ 

It’s not just the words. It’s how people say them—as if they are offering condolences. 

Does anyone tell a sweet young thing she is looking good, as if sizing up a used car with a For Sale sign in the rear window? 

When the subject of the compliment still has all her hormones, people say “good’’ in the way they would say sexy, or hot or cute or fabulous. 

 When people say, “You’re looking good,’’ in that sympathetic tone , what they really mean is “You are looking good for your age’’ or “You are holding up well, considering….’’ 

And you are then left to silently finish the sentence. Considering your neck is collapsing into your collar? Considering you are still alive? 

 And oh, the beauty industry knows how to rock my boat. There is a new magic serum on the shelves every time I blink. Some of them promise to take my neck to new heights. “The studies have been remarkable and my colleagues use it and they look great.’’ I go out and grabbed a crate of the stuff

Sure, on every celebrity talk-show there is some artificially-enhanced star gushing about how all she uses is soap and water and yoga. She is lying through her porcelain veneers. She secretly has sheep farmers in the Alps on speed dial to rush her special orders of rejuvenating lamb cells to inject into her famous body parts. 

 “Oh, I don’t mind my laugh lines and wrinkles. They prove I have had a wonderful life.” My friend said. I looked at her thinking, No one wants the road map of her trip to Italy etched all over her face. In fact, I now use candles in my bathroom, and I am going to stay in the dark about the lines on my forehead