I sat in the dark and thought about my nose.
I like my skin. I live in it, I mean, and you have to appreciate the nifty apparatus it can be. Only trouble is, sometimes in winter it gets dry or appears red. As a genetic gift, I received from my father many of my features, such as a large nose, the shape of my eyes, the fullness in my lips, my oily skin, and thick, nearly-black hair.
In thought again tonight, I ponder my occasional bad complexion and delicate skin balance, wondering if they were apparent to people every day. When people think of me, do they include an inventory of my facial disasters? I think about how right on the side of my nose the skin looked a little red in the mirror tonight, how I should put some moisturizer on it, and how pale I usually look in the mornings until I wash my face.
For unknown reasons, my mind turned to photos of girls in fashion magazines, as the cliche puts it. I wondered, "How often do their noses get red? Do they wear lots of makeup to conceal that?" I then thought makeup would be a bad idea for covering up my facial flaws: "My skin would get so dry again and I'd end up messing it up with my hands when it was irritated and it would never end up right."
What struck me next (and annoyed me beyond belief) was that I wouldn't have spent any energy being genuinely worried about makeup working against my epidermal health and comfort, except that I started comparing my skin to someone else's, and hers was touched up by professionals in order to make it look so naturally beautiful. Oh no, Seventeen is getting to me at last.
Same goes for body image. "If I got up and exercised - maybe 15 minutes of jumping jacks or running or situps.... I need to be thinner!"
But I'm comfortable with my skin. Sometimes my skin misbehaves, but it doesn't last forever, and it's usually not too bad. Wearing makeup, a constant and unnecessary irritation, is something I hardly do by choice. What was I thinking, allowing myself to be influenced by society? As for my body, I know I'm not trying to impress anyone; I'm having a grand time trying desperately not to appear to be giving in to the unwritten mandate for American women weighing over 125 pounds: "Thou shalt not eat," without at the same time eating enough food to kill an Ethiopian village. I feel fine and look fine, and I'm proud I was finally able to come to those conclusions after my teenage years.
However, the minutes in the dark before succumbing to slumber allow your brain the luxury of clean-up, your body the diversion of self-awareness, and your ego of inventory. It would be better sometimes if I just passed out immediately upon touching the sheets.
The mirror is an old friend. As an egotistical person, I think I'm pretty in my own way, and fawn before the image at least once or twice a day. (I'm sorry, I know your perception of me has been woefully skewed, but now that you know I'm morally reprehensible, I hope you can forgive me.) While lights in the overhead lamp are on, I'm pleased with my total self. But as I was saying, after the absence of that light and those visual reminders, coupled with the more abstract (and therefore more perfect) ideas of beauty in my head, I can get rather sullen waiting for my brain to shut down. Right now I'm still mad I allowed images to get to me; how annoying to find out that cliches are working their way into the way you think about yourself.
"Shut up, I still like you--isn't that enough? I say out loud. Before I drop off to sleep, I hope once again that my ego finds something else to do by the time I get tired of seeing the signs of age when I look in the glass. Perhaps then it will finally court my woefully neglected desire to wear makeup. Go assimilation.