out of the mouths of babes

As a woman of a certain age I have passed through the stage where the models and celebrities on the front of women's magazines were older than me, then about the same age, and now, almost without exception, they are younger than I am. Even the "Fit and Fabulous at Forty" models seem pretty young to me. I did notice Christie Brinkley is on some cover just now, talking about motherhood at 52, but she is REALLY the exception to the rule.

So last week as I was passing the magazine rack with my shopping cart and my 5 year old I looked with a mixture of disdain and fascination at the cover of a new magazine devoted to "cosmetic enhancement". On the one hand, I can scarcely believe that "plastic surgery" has become common and accepted enough to rate a magazine in the health and beauty category. On the other hand, I do confess to scrutinizing my face in the mirror in the cruel morning light wondering which parts "they" could fix. Some days I feel as if my father has somehow taken over my face - I wonder where I have gone.

I glanced at the magazine fleetingly, trying to calculate how old the model on the cover really was, and what parts of her face had been fixed. She looked stunning. But then my five year old innocently asked, "Why do that lady's eyes look so funny? Kind of like this. . . " and she put index fingers and thumbs around her eyes and stretched the skin as wide as she could! I could not believe it!! I had been taken in by an eye fix that a five year old could spot!

So what should I learn from this?? First, my perceptions of my own apperaance (and that of others) are probably not trustworthy. I have been, I am sure, as influenced as anyone by the culture of youth in which I live. Granted, I have been mistaken for my daughter's grandmother, but that doesn't have to be an insult! I am old enough to be her gandmother!

Second, I look just right to the people who love me. I still remember the mornings when my "baby", at two years old, would lay in bed beside me in all my puffy-eyed morning glory and say, "Mommy, you have such beautiful eyes. Mommy, you're so pretty." I remember at the time thinking that a late-life baby is better than Botox any day, and I need to remind myself of that often.

Third, cosmetic surgery is probably not all it's cracked up to be. According to my daughter's perceptions it ends up looking unnatural and bizarre. It's probably better to look like a 49 year old with wrinkles and eye bags than a 49 year old with weirdly stretched skin and eyes that barely close. No wrinkles, but not much charm, either. You can't get it back once it's gone.

But I am still tempted by that tummy-tuck my husband promised me on my 50th. . . . .