***
I spent my lunch-break shopping. My ex-husband Richard (calling him Dick now) never liked anything about my looks. When I say never, I mean after we got married. My high heels were inappropriate, my eyes the wrong color, my feet too big, my boobs too small, my legs too thin, my makeup too strong, my taste in fashion frivolous – the list could go on and on. Sadly for me, I really wanted him to like me. I mean, he was my husband, and I loved him – and the thing is – if the one who actually married you (for whatever reason) sees you as a complete visual failure – what are other people seeing? I remember that my self-esteem at the height of my now broken marriage was at an all-time low (ironically) and no fake smile could hide the fact that I was unhappy. Those smiles, they show up on photographs. Sort of like age. You smile and you think you look fabulous and plump like a cherubic 18 year old, and then the picture comes out and you think ‘Who is this old hag with a creepy grimace?! Oh, it’s me!’ I thought of that while smudging different colors of eye shadows on my eyes and wrist at a beauty counter of a local department store. I tried different eye shadows, lipsticks, lip-glosses, blushes, BB creams and whatever the rather amused saleslady offered. By the time I left the store, I looked like a clown. But not the creepy, scary clown that makes people shudder. I was a thirty something divorcée (what an ugly word!), well dressed, smelling of Coco Mademoiselle (because there is no Coco Divorcée), stylish, and most importantly – happy clown. I crossed a little girl and her mom on the way out, and the girl looked up at me, smiled and said to her mom ‘I want to look like this’. Her mother glanced at me a bit uncomfortable and not quite sure how to respond.
‘Clinique counter’, I said, ‘straight down and to the right.’
***
grumpyandpissed 