Gravity

I want a facelift.

Not a super dramatic looks-like-you're-traveling-at-ninety-miles-an-hour kind of facelift, just a little vertical tug here and there. I would love it if that area under my chin were smooth again, and I did use chin in the singular form. I don't want giant lips or chin and cheek implants. I want to be able to move my eyebrows and stop smiling sometimes.

My eyes could use some work. I've always had sort of asian shaped eyes, where you can't even see that I have an upper and lower lid, it's like there are two little sausages perched over my slanting blues. When I was first allowed to wear eye shadow in sixth grade (Bright blue cream frost, oh yeah!) I would walk around with my eyes at half-mast so you could see it. If I opened them all the way the electric blue of 1971 would just roll back into my head and you would never know that I was now mature enough to start accentuating with paint. My eyes are on the wish list too.

I have Dottie's nose. It's a curse, this nose, obviously very strong genetically. It's very round, and tempts people to want to give it a little honk to see if it makes a noise. I have always hated my nose, so I'd get a new one of those too. This is where the rule "Don't touch my nose, ever!" comes from.

Every time I say to Michael "I really want a facelift!" he counters with "I will support any boob job you want to get." WTF? After saying this a few times I attacked him with the full force of unreasonable middle-aged rage. "What the hell is wrong with my boobs?" "Nothing honey" he backpedals, "I just want to be supportive." I have an over-the-glasses glare I save for times like these.

I don't have issues with my boobs. They're not as perky as they were before I gave birth to and nursed three kids, but they're still pretty fantastic for someone my age. If you saw me on my back in the bathtub, or hanging upside down like a bat I think you would agree. If they're properly wedged, strapped and squished they make a cleavage I can use as a second purse. The girls are one of the only parts of my body I'm still happy with.

It's my face that bothers me. It seems that I focus on this especially when I'm getting my hair done, probably because I'm forced to sit there and stare at myself in a giant mirror for two hours. I take my fingers and place them right above my outer cheek bones and lift, only a little bit, and there, isn't that so much better?

I try never to look at myself in the mirror as a rule, except this tiny one I have that only shows one feature at a time. I use it to apply lipstick or if I'm deciding that maybe I'll feel prettier if I wear makeup today. You know, slap on a little eyeshadow that will roll back in my head so no one sees it anyway.

Mascara ends up hitting the lenses of my glasses, so I don't get to be too dramatic with that. I would have to really do it up to get my lashes out from under those awnings that are my upper eyelids anyway. I've always wished I could wear some pink feather and glitter false eyelashes, but my glasses prevent that.

Many women talk about aging gracefully. My plan is to be dragged kicking and screaming every inch of the way. The older I get the more I look like Dottie, which is like gazing into a mirror and seeing a cross between the icon on a poison bottle and Hitler. It's harder and harder to cheer myself with "Well hey, at least you don't have the little mustache."

The sad thing is that although I have never been pretty, I can look at pictures of myself from years ago and think "Hey, that girl is kind of cute." My beauty is entirely retroactive. Maybe if I hoisted up this face that has been battling gravity for nearly a hundred years now I would look more like that girl instead of this old lady. I wouldn't start wearing high heels with little socks and mini-skirts or anything, I just want to tune up my face a little.

I have pictures of Dottie when she's in her thirties, so I can compare myself to them and decide how much I actually look like her and if I look better at that age than she did. Yes, it is a competition. I found one picture of her on Google (at age 66 I think) and she looks decrepit,ancient, miserable. Give it a few more years and I think I'll win that one. Still, I would just love to be happy behind this face right now.

I wish I had a picture of her at the age I really am, I bet I would look way better. That's because I'm not psychotically sociopathic with only selfish motivations coursing through my veins. If I'm currently winning though, I would really like to know it.

Come on Super Lotto! I want a house and a facelift, is that too much to wish for?