If one’s face can’t register an orgasm, is the climax still as good?
Startling as it may seem, I feel liberated by the decay of beauty. It’s a bold statement, but in this era, when the glorification of all that is youthful is paramount, I hope that I look like the mother of my eldest daughter, (who for the record is almost 24,) and not at all like her sister. I don’t want to be in competition with her, or my younger girl, who is only eight. I want them to take up the mantle of their own prime years and have me cheering them on from the proper place - as the more senior female of the clan.
Our society so abhors the discussion of ageing and death, that we have embraced a whole new industry of psychological touchstones involving chemicals and knives and a race to look 10 years younger in 10 days. I don’t castigate or object to anyone making personal choices regarding cosmetic procedures, nor do I rule them out for myself if I feel I want them. But I am concerned that so many of my friends, acquaintances and even other people in the media are beginning to relinquish their unique expressions of emotion and life experience at the point of a needle.
I’ve checked with my optometrist and looked at the lighting, but it’s definite - the purveyors of youth all trained at the same school with injectable facial fillers - rather than tailoring the product to the person, they tailor the person to the product. Youthfully plumped cheeks that would be more at home on chipmunks and duvet-fluffed undereye plateaus are the new accessory du jour.
Now, some maintenance up on the blocks - a little freshening is absolutely understandable, but this bizarre plastic plumping has got to stop, particularly as individuals are now looking more like part of a zombie tribe of waxen dolls or Stepford Wives Mark III. There is a definite stacking of Restalyne, akin to the shoulder pad build-up of the 1980’s.
Frankly I’m scared now at social functions in case I start a conversation with a cushion instead of a girlfriend.
It may sound bizarre and self-serving, but I’ve spent the majority of my life being evaluated as “beautiful”. I know this - it’s not self-conceit, it’s just a fact. The deeply feminine and sensual side of me embraced this erstwhile distinction but life as an objet d’art can be perverse and unfulfilling, especially when one’s brain gets in the way of sitting atop a pedestal.
Admittedly, I have traded on my looks in many ways. I’ve batted my eyelids to obtain a positive outcome during aid work missions in war zones, and simpered slightly to get a waiver on excess baggage at airport check-ins. But none of this would have been more than an ice-breaker or entrée if I hadn’t also developed some substance to back up the initial attention I’d been given.
Many men in my past were attracted to my packaging and would have preferred that my mouth remained closed except at distinctly intimate moments – they paid their own lip service to my, er, mind - but only as long as it was not an impediment to their enjoyment of my outer layer. As time progressed, I slowly learnt that an intellectual orgasm, coupled with a physical one, was the only way of being honest with myself. And more satisfying.
But there is a new part of me that I am discovering as I settle into my forties – the release of still knowing I am attractive, still feeling sexual and desirable, but allowing and embracing some blurring around the edges is wonderful. In essence, my face has finally caught up with my brain and it’s fantastic.
Botox and filler users beware: it is possible to look “over preserved”. Think petrified starfish or blow-up sex dolls. If permanently surprised is your one facial emotion, and “Oh, Oh, baby, yes, yes, YES”, could also be taken for “pass the salt please” in terms of facial expression, then it’s time for a rethink and a change of cosmetic surgeon.
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