Blindly made-up…

So my eyesight is getting so bad that earlier this week I was considering forgoing eye make-up on a regular basis. If I take off my glasses to apply a little eye shadow, liner, and mascara, I can’t see to apply it.  So far that hasn’t prevented me from trying. I’ve tried magnifying mirrors — well, a travel magnifying mirror — but I have to position the mirror and myself “just so” to actually benefit from the magnification. Frankly, I am not that patient, and using it in the steamy locker room at the health club where I am likely to sweat off my perfectly applied make-up makes me less patient. This week I’ve tried standing close to the full-length mirror in an attempt to create my own magnification (i.e. the closer I am to the mirror the better I can see, right?), but I have twice poked myself in the eye with the mascara wand — causing a stream of black tears and a need to wipe away the attempt and reapply. Errggh.

Too often I apply make-up, then my clothes, and then my eyeglasses — and then make my way to my car without ever looking at myself with glasses. When an hour later I use the restroom at work, I finally see how I really appear and am appalled. My eye liner is but a stripe randomly drawn on my eyelid somewhere — and sometimes it even matches the stripe on the other side. My mascara is often where it should not be — I can see that clearly when I view myself in glasses — but when I remove my glasses to tidy up the mess, I look perfectly fine, have nothing to fix.

So I put on my glasses and leave the restroom — without looking back to see what I cannot see to remedy.

This morning, before I put on my makeup (and my glasses), I did my usual routine of flat ironing my hair — and burnt my ear lobe accidentally.

“You’re reverting to being sixteen,” one of my locker room sisters said.

And we immediately shifted into a conversation of teens and curling irons and hickeys, and my currently burned earlobe was forgotten — except for the twinge of pain I experienced when I put in my earring on that side of my head.

As I dressed, one of my friends asked me about the dress I would be wearing to my son’s wedding. I explained the wedding was taking place in a barn and, thus, not as dressy as it might be. I then described my intended dress and my matching shoes and my determination to purchase beads to make jewelry to coordinate.

“It sounds beautiful,” Janna said, before she added, oh-so-casually. “Will someone else be doing your make-up and hair that day?”

Subtle. 🙂

(And, thankfully, I was able to answer “yes.” It’s just the other 364 days of the year I am blindly made-up.)