Beauty – Page 7 – Rant and Roll

The naked truth

So here’s a thing.

Up until two days ago, I wore foundation or concealer (or some combination of both products) every single day (give or take a glitch or two in the algorithm that is my life) for the past fourteen years.

FOURTEEN YEARS.

That is over 5000 days of wearing makeup; makeup that covers up and paints over my natural skin tone, my freckles, my pimples – everything that makes my face, my face.

I wore this makeup on runs, to the beach, to work, to work out, to school dances, to graduations, to family dinners, to the grocery store, to job interviews – I wore it everywhere.

And two days ago, I stopped.

I thought – enough is enough.

I am twenty-eight years old.

It’s time.

This is very representative of how I operate in life. I won’t do something until I have completely made up my mind.

However, once the decision has been made, I will never renege, and I will never look back.

I first started wearing “pressed powder” when I was thirteen years old. I had just started grade eight, and I was very self-conscious of the patch of acne that had sprouted atop on my forehead over the past year.

I wanted to make a good impression, so what better way to do this that spackle six dollar Cover Girl all over my skin?

(The answer: be really, really funny.)

Grade nine brought even worse skin, so I graduated from just the powder, to bottle foundation (that I supplemented with the powder.)

Looking back at photos of myself from that time, I can only laugh. I wore so much of this product that I looked practically a ghost – pale as anything, with super dark red lips, and thick black eyeliner.

I was pretty much a dead ringer for one of the Twilight kids, only ten years too early.

Over the years, my use of foundations and concealers has waxed and waned.

I wrote previously on how this tied directly to my eating disorders – in times of health I used less because my skin was much clearer, and in times of sickness I used much more.

But even at my happiest I always used it.

Everyday.

But two days ago I was out at the park, running myself ragged, doing my favourite combination of sprints, push-ups, pull-ups, squats (and all their ilk) and I just felt so incredibly strong- so alive and powerful.

So confident.

So much so that when I arrived home and showered, I stood in the bathroom and just stared at myself for a long, long time.

For many years, I would do this same thing, but in a highly critical sense. I would scrutinize everything about my body – my skin, my hair, my teeth.

I would pick myself apart, and leave the pieces scattered, broken on the floor.

But this time, however, I marvelled.

At the strength of my muscles, and the glow of my skin; the length of my hair, and pulse of my heartbeat.

And I thought – I will face the world as I am.

Which is not to say that I won’t wear any other makeup ever again.

I love playing dress up too much for that.

But I won’t wear any more skin cover up products.

I’ve got a strong enough foundation as it is.

IMG_20130710_105752 — Today. Post-run. Strong.

These summer nights

I am seventeen years old.

My hair is very long, and its natural chestnut brown fights a never-ending battle against the bottle red I desperately want to be.

My sister is fifteen years old.

She also has long hair, much thicker than mine, into which the sun has burnt beautiful blond streaks, evenly, so that it reflects both a silver and gold shine under the street lamps, at night.

It is the last week of May, and the time of day is so late that it is now in fact early, and I am not sleeping. I haven’t slept properly is many weeks.

To keep the insomnia madness at bay, I am reading in bed, curled tightly around myself, like a croissant. My bedroom door slowly opens, and Jessi tiptoes into my room. She is wearing tight jeans and a man’s dress shirt, oversized on her tiny frame.

Tonight her hair sits tucked under a stained trucker hat that she insists on wearing, and indeed loving.

She looks stunning.

“Let’s go for a drive,” she says, as she crawls over my blankets to lie down next to me. I close my book and turn over, facing her.

“Where do you want to go?” I ask.

“I don’t care.” Jessi pauses as she snuggles down into one of my pillows. She rubs her face aggressively into it, like a cat. “How about the airport?”

“Sure,” I say. The airport is a good choice. It means highway speeds and the opportunity to gawk at the perverse grandeur of the wealthiest neighbourhood in Vancouver.

I sit up and put on my glasses; lean over and pick up the sweater lying on the floor next to the bed.

“What are you reading?” Jessi asks. She gets up and walks over to my closet, absentmindedly flipping through shirts and skirts.

“Dracula,” I respond. After I put on my sweater, I pick up the book and offer it to her. She shakes her head.

“Is it good?”

“Yes,” I tell her.

“Are you okay?”

“Yes,” I say. Come on, let’s go get the spare set of keys.”

…

The warm, wet air whips around the car as we trace the lines of the Fraser River. Jessi has her feet pressed up against the glove box, her knees scrunched up under her chin. Tiffany blasts from the CD player and she and I sing as loud as we can, belting out the lyrics with a zealous, almost manic energy.

“OHHHHH, I THINK WE’RE ALONE NOW.”

I know the words much better than she. She mumbles her way through the bits she is unsure of, only to sing twice as loud during the chorus. I call that “pulling a Mr. Bean.”

“It’s not that I don’t know the lyrics,” she tells me as she shifts herself around in her seat, tilting her face up, so she can meet the rushing night winds and the rushing night, head on. “I just like mine better.”

She cracks herself up.

It is in these moments that I feel what can only be described as complete love for my sister. I want to wrap up my soul with hers and drive on, keep moving past the trees, mountains, water, and stars, until we might float up and away. Away from our earthly bodies, gravity-bound, held down.

Growing up, our mother would always tell us the story of how when we were small, she visited a psychic with a friend. The first thing the woman told her during her reading was that she had borne twin girls. When my mother told her no, the woman was confused. Instead of continuing with the reading, the woman reiterated her previous statement. In response, my mother stated that she had three girls. Her two younger daughters, born two years apart, almost two years to the day, who were birthed at the same hospital, on the same floor, in the same room, assisted by the same doctor. The psychic nodded and smiled. She now understood. These were her twins of which she had spoken.

We were her twins.

One of us had just waited a little longer to come out and play.

As we pull up to the international departures drop-off, I look over at my twin, a girl sewn up in a beauty intricate and rare, bronze skin, eyes of onyx, fingernails of jade, and all I want to do is tell her that I love her.

She looks at me, smiling, her voice feverish.

“I never want to go to school again,” she says. “I wish we could just do this forever.”

I put the car in first gear; slowly ease my right foot off of the clutch, while gently lowering my right onto the gas. I look at her and smile back.

“Where to next?”

…

Say Cheese!

On Monday night Marc and I walked up to London Drugs to get some photos developed.

Can you believe this is actually still a thing?

I barely remember life before digital cameras – a time where you had “rolls” of film, that, once processed, were delivered in an envelope with a set of “negatives.”

How utterly quaint!

Now that we live in the age of the duck-faced selfie, you might be hard pressed to find someone under the age of fifteen (maybe even twenty) who would even know the definition of “negative,” let alone what one looks like.

Excluding, of course, hardcore hipsters, who walk around with their clunky Polaroid cameras, not-so-secretly wishing that real life itself could be viewed through a sepia tone filter.

I am, of course, just waiting for that one enterprising hipster who will start carting around a Rand Collins (you know, the cameras with the curtain, and the post-shot plumes of smoke), and who will always be yelling at their bored-looking girlfriend to “WATCH THE BIRDY!”

Because that will be great.

Anyways, to get back to my original story, on our way back home we walked past this hair salon:

This has got to be the most fun place to work, in the history of places to work.

If I wasn’t so suspicious of what actually consititutes LIVE DJs, I would probably have to go in one day and scope out the joint myself.

Although, any attempt at reconnaissance on my part would probably end poorly. I’d be there, waiting on an eyebrow waxing, all IF THIS ISN’T THE NEW DAFT PUNK I’M OUTTA HERE!

And they’d be all – WHO IS THIS CHICK?

And then I would end up having this done to me:

What?

How?

WHAT COULD THIS POSSIBLY MEAN?

If any of you peeps out there are esthetically inclined, please, I beg of you, explain this “special effects” phenomenon!

Oh, and speaking of complete confusion –

The other day I was out on a lunch walk-about with my terrific friend Katie (she being in hot pursuit of a fab dress to wear to the many weddings she will be going to this upcoming summer) when we came across this outside of Forever XXI:

Now, individuals who have been reading this here blog for many moons will know that I have a long-standing love/WTF relationship with this store.

I have procured a number of lovely pieces from its many sales racks, but more often than not I am overwhelmingly mystified by the majority of the vestments on display within the store.

In short: EVERYTHING IS CRAZY.

I mean, just look at this poster.

LOOK!

This woman is literally wearing animal-print diaper pants.

If someone asked me to name this garment, I would answer, “Depends.”

They are crazy and I don’t understand why anyone would want to walk around outside, in the daylight, looking like they had freshly filled their drawers.

THIS IS NOT A GOOD LOOK FOLKS.

I have no hard feelings either way towards this whole “bralet” trend, suffice to say that it’s not really my cup of tea, but heck if I will trample on someone’s rights to sport a seven dollar, studded bra top.

Unless, of course, it’s sags all the way down to their ankles.

Then we’ll need to talk.

To the night, to the trees

I am eighteen.

It’s summer.

I have just finished a closing shift and am walking home because I have no patience to sit around and wait for the night bus.

My legs are tired after eight hours on my feet, but walking feels good; I am exorcising the ache from my limbs.

The sidewalk is shaded by old elms that whisper to each other in the late-night breeze.

The moonlight is splintered by these long-armed giants, so my path is guided by the soft glow of the streetlamps.

It always feels so much more romantic than I think it should.

I take off my tie, and unbutton the top of my blouse.

Roll up my pants.

I like the feel of the light breeze along my collarbones, my bare wrists.

And I think of a boy.

I imagine him saying my name.

When I get home I change into clothes as light as air.

My bedroom is still hot from the now-lost sunshine; the memory of its heat has settled, and nestled itself in every nook.

A phantom warmth.

I open the windows as far as they will reach. I take a deep breath, and smell the sweet scent of night.

My sister is away for the weekend, so I am alone.

In the kitchen I look at the photos taped to the fridge; it’s like my family has been blown far and away by Aeolus’ winds, and my heart tweaks.

I make peppermint tea, and sit in the quiet of the living room. My cat Sophie perched at the window sill, her copper eyes brilliant, but still.

She too is listening to the whispering trees.

I want to pick up the phone and talk.

I would like to talk to the boy.

Feel his hand on mine.

–

Time passes.

My tea cools, and my eyelids start to droop.

I leave my mug, half-drunk on the floor.

As I walk about to my bedroom I realize I have once again forgotten to water the plants.

Tomorrow, I think.

My room is cool, and smells of silence.

I close the window, but not entirely. A sliver of moonlight shines through my curtains – a bolt of lightning etched into the centre of my bed.

Under the blankets I let out a small sigh.

Tomorrow I will eat cherries for breakfast, I whisper.

To the boy.

To the night.

To the trees.

For no particular reason, I decided to go for a little run

Hey dudes!

This weekend I competed in the BMO April Fool’s Half-Marathon on the Sunshine Coast of British Columbia.

Somehow I managed to pull out the best run of my career, finishing the course in 1:31:36, and coming 7^th out of all women (3^rd in my age group) and 29^th overall (out of 537 participants).

HOLY SMOKES.

To say that I am stoked would be a bit of an understatement, but I am very, very tired and as such, there is a bit of a competition between my exhaustion and my happiness.

So as I sit here in front of the fire, clad in nothing but an over-sized t-shirt and sweatpants, I am mostly just very comfortable, and very cozy.

And that’s pretty awesome.

Marc and I left for Gibsons on the last ferry on Friday night, eager as we were to avoid the Saturday ferry traffic, and just get comfortably ensconced in our race-weekend digs (the paradise on Earth hideaway I have so often written about) as soon as possible.

His parents were also up for the weekend, and were lovely enough to accommodate our late check-in. As such, we tried to be as quiet as possible when we arrived a little after eleven o’clock at night.

Despite our own knackerdness, the lateness of the hour had made us absolutely ravenous and we spent a good fifteen minutes loitering about the kitchen, stuffing our faces with the delicious sushi we had not been able to eat earlier.

If you haven’t had the chance to sample the Maple Roll from Okonomi Sushi, YOU HAVEN’T LIVED.

Then we went to bed and slept for nine and a half hours.

Saturday, in an effort to conserve as much energy as possible, I did pretty much zilch.

Highlights include: listening to a lot of good music, completing the NYT Saturday crossword, enjoying a beautiful jaunt about the harbour with my parents-in-law in their boat, and finding this record:

EPIC.

This is why I married a (half) Swiss man.

I mean, they are LITERALLY singing about ham.

I love it.

That night, after eating my fill of spinach and cheese ravioli, grilled veggies, salad, fruit, and rhubarb and strawberry cake, I read a little before falling into a rather (for lack of a more eloquent word) crap sleep.

My dreams I tell ya, they are CRACKED.

The next morning I woke up to my alarm at 6:15 and immediately checked the weather outside.

No rain.

Thank goodness.

Then I made coffee, and read the newspaper.

I’m pretty weird and slightly superstitious when it comes to my race-day preparations, so I like to do everything in the same order as I have in the past:

Drink water.
Drink coffee.
Drink more water.
Get ready
Eat a banana with peanut butter.
Leave.

We were out the door by 7:30, and although the day was cool and the wind was making its presence known, the skies were still clear.

This was a terrific sign, because I’ve never run a race without a pair of AWESOME and GIANT sunglasses, and I didn’t want to end this streak to end at this run.

To combat the cold, I wore my long lululemon running pants (I normally loathe ye olde cult of LULU but heck if they don’t make a cracking running pant), a long MEC running top (SO GOOD) and my ScotiaBank half-marathon shirt (for great memories).

The ride to Gibsons was about forty-five minutes, and to pass the time, Marc and I sang along to this sweet mixed CD I recently made. (Highlights included a raucous version of Sisters are Doing it for Themselves and Third Eye Blind’s Never Let You Go.)

Once we got to the community centre, I picked up my race package and then proceeded to go to the bathroom five times.

Phantom pre-run pee here people. LOOK IT UP.

Before I knew it, it was 9:15, and it was time to head to the start line with all the other competitors.

Marc, playing paparazzi, took a number of snaps of yours totally unaware.

Oh, and also this one:

(Of this I was aware.)

I like to start as close to the start line as possible, so I huddled up with all the other elite runners and counted down with the course marshal –

5…4…3…2…1…- and they’re off!

The first part of the race I felt that I was running really fast. I was a bit worried that perhaps I had gone out a little too quick and, believe it or not, I actually wondered perhaps if I should have peed one more time before setting off.

Sheesh.

At around the four kilometer mark I felt as though I settled into a good rhythm. As we maneuvered in and around one of the town’s residential neighbourhoods, I tried to focus on keeping my stride as long as possible.

Around the six kilometer mark we were back out on the highway, which if I’m honest, was pretty miserable, what with the wind blowing right into me, and the traffic creating even more of a head wind.

But soon enough we were back into beauty central, running down side-streets flanked by gorgeous arbutus, douglas fir, cedar, and alder trees.

It was also around this time that the terrain began to get really hilly.

And we all know how fun that is, don’t we?

Kilometer seventeen was a mixed bag, because I felt absolutely destroyed after cresting a massive hill, but overjoyed because Marc’s parents were there waiting to cheer my on.

And from there, believe me when I say that it really did seem to be over in a flash.

My right foot felt very hot, so I knew that I had a blister forming, and my knees were a little sore, but otherwise, I felt great as I put the pedal to the metal for the last four kilometers.

As I ran past the final aid station at kilometer nineteen, all these little girls yelled out. “WE LOVE YOUR SUNGLASSES!”

That was all I pretty much needed to get me through the homestretch.

As I rounded the very last corner, I caught sight of the race clock, and I couldn’t believe that it said 1:31.

I sprinted as hard I could across the finish line, totally incredulous that I had run so fast.

Then I met up with Marc and his parents and had the chance to take many funny photos.

After, it was time to chow down on some cookies and yogurt, and head back to town.

So in the end, it was a really brilliant day.

I must give a HUGE thank you to my lovely cheering squad (the amazing Mr. M and his parents) and the fab organizers of the race.

I’ll for sure be back.

You can count on it.