In Which You Enter My Dressing Room

October 13, 2005 by NML

As the late, great Estée Lauder said: “No woman is ugly, there are only women who either do not believe in them selves or do not try”

Well I’m a trier and a believer. I sit there in my dressing room in front of the mirror, plucking and primping, moisturising and exfoliating, holding back the years with a rainbow of palettes. I shave, I wax, I clean. I use face packs of mud, of aloe vera, of Dead Sea salt. I never, ever forget to take my makeup off and I moisturise last thing at night, after a bath or shower and always under makeup. I haunt Clinique. I roam the Harrods Beauty Room, and I jealously stare through mascara’d, narrowed eyes at the 20 year old who has gone out wearing just a slick of lip balm and some cheap perfume.

The thing is, I know I’m letting down the sisterhood here. I know there are much better things to do than prettify and it’s always the person inside that counts. I have been attracted to a lot of ugly, short men in my time simply because of their mind. I also realise that (thank the Lord!) I have been blessed with a brain and a wit and can hold my own against most people (but not the sports aficionados. I really neither know nor care what makes them tick. Sorry.) and that my appearance Does Not Count At All but still I prink. Because. …… you know it’s all complete bollocks really.

When you get over 40, people rank you amongst the invisible middle-aged. They won’t make a point of coming up to you in bar or at a party to talk and enjoy your wit and sparkle and repartee. They want to be seen with the young, the good looking and in the case of men, probably with the double D’s. I know all you blokes out there are going to protest and say you don’t and you won’t, but darlings, you do. You can be happily enjoying a conversation with me, we could be talking a blue streak, but all of a sudden, some blonde (it’s always a blasted blonde!) will walk by in a pelmet, a pair of bosoms balanced precariously on top of a pair of long legs, and immediately you’re away with the fairies. You’re talking to me sideways as you surreptitiously follow her walk. And you are consciously/unconsciously noting that she’s out with friends/on her own/ with a boyfriend/looking bored/looking upset etc*. You will probably then offer to get me a drink and will take the path past the afore-mentioned vision and ever-so-slightly swagger as you go. Alright then, you’ll hold your head up and your stomach in and notice whether she notices you.
So until all men bow down in Adoration of The Diva, I shall spend a bloody fortune hiding the grey hair and the wrinkles.
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