Fantasy Plastic Surgery

Today, for some uncomfortable reason, I seemed to spend quite a bit of time pondering the subject of aging.
Upon reflection I think I’d really rather not participate in that venture. It doesn’t seem to be much fun. I’m going to ask my mother to write a note to excuse me.

The first person that I discussed the matter with is some years older than me and she revealed that she had just reached the point where she realised that she could not pass for young any more, even in good lighting, and supermarket checkout guys no longer flirted with her. She said that this was hard to accept. She is happily married with a child, but she did not anticipate the pain it would cause her to be sexually invisible, how she had taken for granted her youthful beauty and how she would mourn its passing.

This struck a chord of deep, cold fear into my heart.
I am not at that point yet, still fighting it off.
But that terrible day is going to come for me. And for you.

Oh my GOD! (Scrabbles frantically for drugs, sun block, expensive unguents, gun to shoot self etc)

Later in the day I took Four and One to play with some other children of their ages and I sat chatting companionably with their mother, a very nice, natural sort of woman who is a few years younger than me. Suddenly, without any prompting, she revealed her sadness that that having children had aged her face and body beyond recognition. She confided that she was considering Botox to erase the frown line between her eyebrows. Did I think that was shallow? (I assumed she meant her values, not the line but the answer anyway is no.) I found this charmingly naïve and reassured her that I thought it was just fine and she should do it at once. An ounce of prevention being better than a pound of cure etc.

Then I took a stroll over to Belgian Waffle‘s site and saw that she was rolling around the floor in fits of wailing inadequacy brought on by some pratt’s list of what you should have achieved by age 35. Most of it seemed amazingly trite to me, and a glimpse of the narrowness of the imagination and life of the columnist, but it did have the effect of making one aware of the ticking of the old clock and the limited number of days left before I “sniff the bucket”, as my Great Auntie Hazel used to say

All this talk of mortality, aging, dwindling youth, and missed opportunities led me, inexorably, back to thinking about my incredibly boring hair, the subject of one of my earlier posts.

I can feel myself working up to a dramatic and probably ill-advised change.

I used to have fabulous, improbable starlet hair. You know, long, blonde, thick, bouncy, sexy, and completely artificial looking. Nobody has that colour hair unless they are a something that ends in -star (pop, rock, movie, porn, etc)

Now I have housewife highlight hair. It was all that falling in love bollocks and wanting to please Husband with the natural look.

I think I’m over that now. Both the pleasing Husband bit (sorry, Darling) and the natural look. It’s not fabulous and I don’t look younger, cuter, or have any more friends because of it. Hate it. Hate it hate it hate it hate it!

I feel extra annoyed when people tell me that they like my hair and it suits me. How do THEY know? I think it would suit my personality better to have completely unsuitable hair, actually. And if I have giant dark roots poking out, well so much the better. What more fitting way to express my inner being than that?
Did someone say trailer trash?
Bring it on!
Did someone whisper mutton dressed as lamb?
My signature style.

It’s not really that I think I can go back and recapture the past, my erstwhile youth.
It’s more that I have this feeling that I really will grow old if I don’t reclaim something vital about myself, even if it’s as simple as a headful of mad hair.

Perhaps this is what they call the midlife crisis.
Instead of getting a sports car and running away with a 19 year old I am going to dye my hair an inappropriate colour and make plans for minor cosmetic work. It’s actually one of my favourite (oh, so unfeminist!) pastimes:

Fantasy Plastic Surgery

Other people play fantasy sports and make up teams, I think up all the procedures I would have, in theory, if I had the time, money, inclination, and a guarantee that I wouldn’t end up like the Bride of Wildenstein. 

Currently on the list:

• Botox. Restylane, Sculptra
• Breast lift to restore position prior to infant decimation (no augmentation, size ok)

For Future use: 

• Facelift (timing dependent on supermarket checkout boy reaction)
• Brow lift (to make eyebrows arch elegantly as they actually never have done)
• Do something about veins on hands when they start looking like granny claws
• Whatever it is that Madonna has, because she does not look 50,and is maybe better looking than when she was young.

This is not an exclusive kind of game, so you’re welcome to play. And playing Fantasy Plastic Surgery does not commit you to any kind of procedure nor to condoning them in real life. I, myself,  am unlikely to do any of these (mainly for financial reasons, but also because my lack of cash ties in neatly with my feminist principles).

If you had the world’s scalpel at your disposal, and nobody would know your secret, what would you have done?