Makeup Your Mind

The only makeup I wear to work on a daily basis is mascara. I know what you are thinking, “Wait, you mean to tell me you are that beautiful and you only wear mascara? Not blush or foundation or lipstick?” Firstly, I would modestly look behind me towards the coffee maker to see if you meant to aim your compliment at me, or our coffee maker; a short woman named Rosa. “Who me?” I’d ask with my hand spread across my chest right as if I were catching my breath. I’d smile and flutter my eye lids.

Secondly I would tell you that the last time I wore lipstick was three years ago in college for a Shakespearean themed party, where I disguised myself as one of the three Weird Witch Sisters from Macbeth. They are mysterious adult women who look like nuns and roam the cold beaches of London. I brought .99 cent lipstick from Walgreens and painted my lips black. The goth within me surfaced and I felt really cool. I casted over three hundred Love Spells on the drinks of unknowing classmates’. After the 200th one, I lost track of who I made fall in love with whom and caused a lot of jealousy and the first on-campus riot.

It was a last minute costume choice so I didn’t have time to gather two other girls to play my Witch-Sisters. I told anyone who asked that they were on an all-inclusive wiccan cruise to the Cayman Islands.

In the past, I wore eye-liner as well as mascara, but had to stop doing so. After wearing it for a couple of hours the black residue runs under my eyes making me look like a sleep deprived drug addict. I would walk into a conference room for a meeting and notice co-workers begin to whisper. After a month I received an email from our Human Resource contact asking me if I needed a sleeping mask or a rehabilitation recommendation. I switched to water-proof eye liner the next day, but it continued to run black.

From the time I wake up, I give myself a half hour in the morning to get ready for work and leave the house. I spend 10-15 minutes styling my hair, picking out clothes, and putting the clothes on my body. I spend 5 minutes eating breakfast which consists of a granola bar and glass of water. I spend another five minutes making a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for lunch. I use the remaining 5-10 minutes dealing with unpredicted issues that need to be addressed. This includes printing documents, finding my phone that I left on silent, and/or searching for change through the house that amounts to my $5.50 bus fare. Yesterday I left the house 6 minutes behind schedule because there were only nickels left in the change jar and I found my mother’s purse fastened with a diary lock.

Because of my strategically planned mornings, I sometimes forget to put on mascara before work. My options then become applying it on the car ride to the bus stop or applying it in the bathroom at work. My mother drives me to the bus. She thinks I am going to poke my eye out and scolds me for doing makeup while in the car. I am therefore forced to do the latter and apply once I arrive to work. The problem with this is, I become very self-conscious when people see me doing my makeup or hair in the bathroom. I get embarrassed if a co-worker walks in and notices I am applying makeup. I can’t have people knowing I actually try to look good.

The following is a true storey that LEGIT happened to me:
Last week I walked into the work bathroom and found it empty. I needed to re-style my hair so I ran in front of the mirror. I took out the bobby pin that held back my hair and held it in my hand. I tried to rush so no one would walk in. My hair was down and wavy and in my face. I heard someone opening the first bathroom door. There is one door that leads to a “foyer” if you will, then another door that leads to the actual bathroom where I stood. To hide the fact that I was grooming myself, here is what I did: Let me first say, that this is really weird and I acknowledge that. I took the bobby pin and shoved it in my mouth. There was now a bobby pin in my mouth. I immediately thought, “What if I know the person who walks in and they want to talk to me? How am I going to speak with a bobby pin in my mouth?” Just as I heard the second door open, I spit the bobby pin back into my hand and smiled at the girl who walked in, Lisa Cullen. She is another production assistant on the floor. “Hey What’s up?” she asked me. I just kept smiling, threw my hair up in a bun atop my head, and sped walked out the two doors.

To solutionize my life, I don’t do my hair or wear mascara. I resorted to hats and sunglasses.

The End.

EPILOGUE: I would like to take this second to give a warm “Thank You” to my good friend, co-worker, and spiritual coach Jenny L who accompanied me into the bathroom to take the above picture.

Below is a picture of Jenny. She works in Television Production. On the side she is an Amateur Scuba Diver [ASD]. She tells everyone who passes her desk about her deep see adventures. “I dive three days a week”, “Flippers give me great calf muscles”, “I one rescued a dying baby squid and resuscitated it back to life with a cocktail straw”. Once, our boss was rushing down the hallway to a meeting and Jenny grabbed her arm just to tell her how many water bubbles she can make in under a minute. Suspiciously, our boss found this extremely interesting. They dove into an hour long conversation about Prescription Goggles.

Here is Jenny and my ICHAT Conversation to initiate the picture taking.

A Poem About Jenny’s Need to Save all Sea Creatures from Extinction:

Jenny sits behind me at work. I turn and see the back of her head
She swivels her chair around, and tells me, “All the sea animals are dead.”
“The string rays are dying one by one, the otter will soon be extinct.
I want to capture all the of fish, and raise them in my sink.”
She puts her hands up to her eyes. Salty tears fall down her cheek.
“What did they do to deserve this? They surely won’t live more than a week.”
The tears remind her of the ocean, because the ocean is salty too.
I try to distract her by telling her I’ll take her to the Bronx Zoo.
“Ok”, she says starting to smile. I ask to borrow a document on disc.
I conclude this wouldn’t be a good time to tell her for lunch I brought Lobster Bisque.