| Coloring Inside the Lines | ||
| First published in The Hartford Courant | Select another essay | |
 | ||
This point was made most visible to me during a recent visit to London, where we were welcomed by Sandy and Leonard into their home, during which time, I must admit, we settled in like happy puppies. Really, really happy puppies. Sandy and I shopped, ate crepes, drank champagne, and gossiped. (I know, it's a tough life, but somebody's got to do it. . .) We would also hook up to put on makeup before we went out for the evening. Guys don't do this sort of thing: for the life of me I cannot imagine Michael calling out, "Hey, Leonard, you wanna go shave together?" But I was more than content to sit at the all-to-appropriately named vanity table and have displayed before me all the glorious little pots, paints, and brushes by which we transform the face God has given us into another. Now. I like makeup. I've been made to feel mortally ashamed of this indulgence by women and men who are "better" feminists than I am, who argue that by applying goop to my face I'm capitulating to the socially engineered dominance of a cosmetics industry that exploits women and animals, and controls with insidious force the media images plastered ubiquitously across billboards. My answer to them is: "Yes." Having said this, I do like makeup. I especially like those little, tiny sample supplies given out as "free gifts" (as opposed to those nasty "gift-with-purchase" offers where you have to do something to be given a gift. Let me put it this way: I deeply resent those bargains in life and so not surprisingly I can't abide them at the lipstick counter, either.). I have about 1,700 "free-gift" objects scattered throughout my bathroom, office, purse, and glove compartments. Just in my everyday bag, the one I carry with me at all times -- in case I have to begin life anew in a different country without much notice -- I carry a dozen teensy-weensy sample mascaras. Some ofthese I've had with me since the Carter administration; they're probably no longer fashionable. Actually, they are probably no longer viscous; by this time they've probably mutated into a geological formation. But I refuse to throw them away. Makeup is one of the few things I'll hold onto until the very last smudge; I'll scoop out the last few molecules of a favorite lipstick by using a cotton swab, This is a sad act to witness, not because it is tragic, but because it is obsessional. I fell into this habit back in my student days, when the purchase price of a full-size lipstick took most of a week's paycheck. I persist in doing it, however, not only out of habit but because cosmetic companies inevitably decide to cease all production of my favorite colors 10 minutes after I have purchased them. OK, I hear you: Maybe I should take the hint. This is sort of what Sandy was gently trying to tell me over there under the shadows of Big Ben and St. Paul's: Maybe I should pay more attention to how I apply this paint. Sandy began the process of showing me what to do, as we sat in twin robes in front of her mirror. Turns out that I should never, ever have been putting on mascara and eyebrow stuff first -- you're supposed to do this last Diane, another friend, had already explained this to me but I suppose I hadn't quite had the presence of mind to see it as the deep threat to my appearance as Sandy indicated it could be. I think I was supposed to put on lip-liner first. I can't apply lipliner; I've never been able to color inside the lines. Sandy tried to teach me. I tried to follow her instructions. Dutifully, I lined my lips. Yes, I looked like someone from a movie. Unfortunately, the character I looked like was Blanche DuBois from "A Streetcar Named Desire"; this was not the look I had hoped to achieve. Sandy tried to show me how to highlight my cheekbones and then to employ eyeliner. Simultaneously engaged in the same activities, Sandy began to look like a Vogue model; I was beginning to look like Tim Curry from "The Rocky Horror Picture Show," only not as good. Long story made short: I learned how it was supposed to be done, but I couldn't do it. After I'd adjusted the Sweet Transvestite look into something slightly more becoming a middle-aged professor, I was ready to go out. Michael liked how I looked, but then Michael usually likes how I look, which is -- after all -- one of the reasons we are married. The evening was wonderful, full of good food and good talk, and I forgot about what I was wearing and whether or not my nose was shiny. It was so much fun I didn't notice whether Sandy's lipstick needed touching up or wonder if the blush on her cheek came from the laughter or the brush. And I bet that neither Michael nor Leonard noticed whether either of them needed a shave. | ||