Image Grenade

Don’t believe the hype about 40 being the new 20.

It’s soooo not.

For 40 to look even 35 takes constant vigilance, and an armload of products. Even if you’re not in a business where being at least a 9 is required, don’t be so naive as to believe “it’s not like that in the real world.”

Ad the saying goes, You cannot control how you are perceived, you can only control how you are presented. Of course how you are presented goes a long way in how you are treated. To make sure I’m working hard with the few physical gifts God gave me, here’s a list of the 24 products I use daily for upkeep. (Note!! this doesn’t even begin to cover the weekly skin treatments, nail varnishes or hair color)

If you don’t use or need this many products, say a big thank you to your creator. As for me, it’s not about vanity, it’s about having enough pride in myself to want to put my best face forward, and in a city full of the ugly, unkempt and great unwashed, the best thing I can do, is not be counted in their numbers.

Before I get in the shower, I floss with Johnson & Johnson’s Mint Waxed Dental Floss,  use my Oral B Triumph electronic toothbrush loaded with Crest Vivid White and finished with Go Smile oral rinse. I wash my face with Dr. Susan Taylor’s RX for Brown Skin facial wash  (www.societyhilldermatology.com) before showering with Kiehl’s Musk. (www.kiehls.com) I shampoo with Ouidad Curl quencher shampoo  (www.ouidad.com) and drop in Rene Furterer Fioravanti Anti Frizz Silkening Conditioner (available at Sephora) while I’m giving the old armpits a once over with Shick Intuition razor. I’m big on prevention and spot treatment so before I turn the shower off, I make sure to rub my wobbly bits (read thighs and buttocks) with Buffy the Backside Slayer.(available exclusively at Lush and www.lush.com) Then with the shower off and before I’m completely dry, I slather my skin in Glytone body lotion. (Available only at dermatologists (or occasionally on ebay) this lotion with a low dose of glycolic acid helps in the resurfacing and restoration of winter scaly skin.)

Then I wipe my skin with RX for Brown Skin toner and I follow with a big spray of Bliss The Big Screen SPF30 sunscreen (www.blissworld.com) on my face neck and decollete. Because sunblock can be a bit thick, I apply a thin film of  RX for Brown Skin Ultra Gentle Moisturizer topped with Clinique UV Response SPF 30 for face.(www.clinique.com). Once that is dry, I slip on Kiehl’s Ultra Facial tinted facial moisturizer in Medium. I top that with a quick

On to hair. I spray my Cesarean curls with Ouidad Botanical Boost before  Climate Control conditioner gel defines their diminutive coil. I then swipe my pits with Mitchum for women before spritzing my favorite fragrance du jour, Philosophy’s Falling in Love.

Then back to the face. By now, time is running out so it’s a quick swipe with MAC eyeshadow, StyleStyle eyeliner, and MAC lipstick (with liner if I’m wearing an extra dark color).

Finally before putting on my base layer of lingerie, there’s the addition of a Carefree thong pantyliner.

So, does it really take all of that, every day. You betcha. And I’m not one of these slackers who drops the ball on the weekends. My mother, that font of guidance, always encouraged me to shower and put on a face even if I didn’t feel well. You see sometimes, to overcome what you feel on the inside, you have to take care of the outer-layer first. And while I’m hardly a threat to the Tyras and Heidis  of the world, when I see what’s trolling the streets of Philadelphia, apparently I’m not the only one who could benefit from a couple of dozen products…and a damn good brow wax.

Sometimes when you spruce one thing up, its’ newly revamped beauty tends to make the surrounding unrefurbished things look really shabby.

Such was the case after having my first chemical peel. Sure my skin was glowing, but in comparison, the horizontal lines on my forehead looked even worse, at lease to me. So just six days later I arranged to have Botox injections.

The afternoon before Thanksgiving, while most people were preparing to stick thermometers in poultry, I was the turkey getting jabbed.

Being a Botox virgin, I didn’t know what to expect. When I asked the doctor, she said it wasn’t bad and the needles were very fine. Then she made me wrinkle my brow and she proceeded to inject directly into it. As she penetrated the skin, she asked “See, now that’s not bad is it?” And it wasn’t, until she continued jabbing through the skin and into the muscle. OWWWW! Okay so I thought it, rather than saying it, but there was quite a bit of jaw tensing to prevent screaming out.

And after about eight injections, she told me to continue to raise and lower my brow to sort of “work the Botox in.” That was it. She told me it would take a few days before I saw any result, and told me to make a follow up appointment in one week so she could monitor my progress. Fifteen minutes and four hundred seventy bucks later, I was back on the street as if nothing had happened, save for a slightly sore forehead.

I celebrated Thanksgiving as usual and enjoyed a relaxing, extended weekend away from work , taking the occasional time out to look in the mirror and raise and lower my eyebrows, to see if I could detect any differences. For several days, everything was status quo, and then, on Sunday afternoon, it happened.

Nothing.

NOTHING!!!!!!!

I raised and lowered my brow,  and nothing happened.

 I shouldn’t say nothing because the very ends of my eyebrows twitched;

 but that deep, furrow in the middle, was no longer there.

 It was fantastic!!

My brow remained still.

I looked calm and serene.

 It was amazing.

And while there are those around me who will never understand why I did it,

 I’m glad I did

 and I love my mother for financing it.

In a world where most things don’t live up to the hype, my Botox experience was not one of them. And while  the results last only about six months, I’ll be saving my pin money for the booster shots.

Not looking stressed is great. but when you’ve spent most of your life using your eyebrows as punctuation, it will be great having a face that doesn’t betray my every private thought.

And with a face that shows only the emotions I want to reveal, who knows,

I might even win an occasional hand of poker.