Grey hair like elephants pubes.
I was watching the telly last night and one of those adverts came on about anit-aging creams. You know the ones, they show a close up of a wrinkle, so close that it looks like the Grand Canyon, then they fill it will 'cream' which looks more like construction grade ciment. And, hey presto no more wrinkles! Well, I have tried them all - they don't work. Nothing in this world will make me look like the actress in the advert, who I know is at least 10 years older than me, but looks 20 years years younger.
Then there is the grey hair adverts. paste a bit of colour on your roots and after 10 mins you too can have lustrous, non-grey hair. Well, as a hairdresser with over 20 squillion years experience I know that after 10 mins, the grey hair will still be grey-ish and still be as coarse as the aforesaid elephants pube.
What is this ageing process all about anyway? Why is it that as we get older, we get more confident, more sure of ourselves (really, when does that happen?) and wiser, only to have our looks go down the pan (well in my case anyway). When I look at photos of me at 20, I was hanging out with a rock band, really slim in skin tight jeans and high heeled boots, wild hair and feeling great, only to have my mum say that I was putting on weight and my thighs were looking chunky! All through my late teens and early 20's when I was having a great time all I got was 'you've put on weight', or 'I saw so-and-so at the weekend, she said you had put on weight'. Apart from anything SO WHAT!!!!! Now at 44 minus 2 months I have most definitely put on weight and would give my eye teeth to look like I did at 20. But my 20's were full of being unsatisfied with my weight, being told I was a porker. although in todays term size 10/12 is a porker, and eating nothing but grapefruits for a fortnight at a time!
I have to say that I don't feel old enough to be my age. At my age my mum had 4 kids, I've got 4 cats, 6 chooks and an OH. I thought that at this age I was meant to feel 'grown up' and 'know what I was doing with my life'. I've got quite a good idea about the latter, but Dad still likes to throw a spanner in my thoughts every so often.
Still, try to stay positive. I live in a lovely rural area of France, in a house that is almost finished being renovated (when I can sit back at look at it all finished, we'll sell up and do it again), with a great OH, gorgeous cats and a kitten and funny chickens, got great friends around me, so who cares if I have 'put on weight'!
11 comments:
I'm always the fattest person in the room, wherever I go here in France. And to be honest, it does get to me sometimes, but never for long.
As a single guy, I never seem to want for attention, despite the extra kilos. I get chatted up fairly regularly - and I get taken home from time to time too!
Rather than blend in to a sea of like-sized people (as I would in the UK), here in France the weight makes me something of a 'oiseau exotique'.
I'm more than happy to use it to my advantage!
Ah the casual flippant way people can chuck a 'fat' comment at you and get away with buggering up your psyche. I look back at old photo's of me and I was gorgeous and yet I believed myself to be just passable on a good day. I do believe that I am more confident at fifty but in other ways I am more fearful - that the grim reaper could be looming and that I now have more years behind me than there is in front. I loved this post - made me think! Just buy the Pollyfilla and be done with it woman! You could try the old sink estate face lift and scrape your hair right back in a tight bun! I lift at least one of my chins when I do that!
Hi Travelling, but not in love, thank you for visiting me. You are right that differences are better accepted here than in the UK. Keep chatting up those chicks you oiseau exotique! :-)
Hi MOB, Your comment about looking back at photo's rang so true. WHen I look at them now I wonder how could I have been so disatisfied with myself! Ahh, the benefit of hindsight. If only I had known I would become forty and a bit porky ....
The trouble is with those creams - they only come in small jars! Doesn't anyone do them by the gallon (sorry - litre in France)? My sister once went to the hairdressers and came to the conclusion they were only hairdressers - not miracle workers! Roll on lambing - I'll lose the weight I put on in summer (what I'll do when we retire Lord only knows).
Hi Farming Frenchstyle, Jumbo sized face cream pots - now that would be a real winner! As a hairdresser it always made me smile when people would bring in a magazine picture of the style they liked, but say 'I want to look like this'. The photo would be of a 20 year old stunner with perfect make-up, and my client would be 50+ with more wrinkles than an elephants knee cap!
Oh, sounds familiar! Have just the photo, hopefully not (yet) all the wrinkles round the elephant's knees! Am still working on those!
Yes I'm still waiting for that grown up feeling but at least here and now(especially here0 it's not the end of the world if I don't have exactly the right thing to wear
Hi Farming, as long as the wrinkles are laughter lines and not frown lines you'll be alright.
Hi Breezy, if the girls at work could see what I wear now, they would die! When I put a bit of make up on these days OH wonders whats up!
"But my 20's were full of being unsatisfied with my weight"
I resemble that comment! It all started when I was about 14 and some cow in PE class said "Why's your bum so big?" Now I'd give anything to be that weight again! Actually, not really. So long as I don't put any more weight on (which would mean buying new clothes) I'm quite happy.
Hi Almost American, thank you for visiting me. It is so sad that a casual comment can have such a big effect on people. When I look back at photos from my late teens and early 20's I would love to look like that now, and have the choice of anything in the shops. Now I go clothes shopping when I sbsolutely have to, and have to think which shops will stock my size. Not that I am huge but there is no point in going to trendy shops because they cut their clothes really small.
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