Makeup?

When I was twelve years old, I lived in a smallish town and had two older brothers that sometimes beat me up the way siblings do and sometimes protected me the way siblings do.  Other times I have no real definition for what was actually happening.

For instance, there was the time I tried on my mom's eyeliner and when I came out of the bathroom my older brothers both started laughing at me.  But not in an "Oh my god, that's fucked up!" kind of way, but more in a "Wow, you need help." kind of way.

So, my brothers lead me back into the bathroom where Jeff told me he'd seen lots of girls put on their eyeliner and my other brother, Jerrimy hovered over his shoulder watching while I trusted Jeff to draw on the inside of my lower eyelid with a black pencil.

I walked out of that bathroom that day feeling absolutely beautiful and looking like a hooker.  Every day for a couple of weeks, my brother would put my eyeliner on for me.  Every day before coming home from school, I would wash my face so my mom wouldn't see it.

And then I got the hang of it.  Well, I sort of got the hang of it.  You see, I got used to drawing on my lower inner eyelid and didn't poke myself in the eye as often and even started doing little "Cleopatra" lines at the edge of my eyes.  I thought I was totally awesome because none of the other girls in my grade wore makeup.

Then I discovered liquid foundation at thirteen.  I experimented with it to get it to match my skin colour and I didn't just put it on my face, I covered my entire face, eyelids, lips, ears and even my neck with it.  I didn't want any of those lines I saw on other girls.

And blush.  Oh did I love my blush.  I used it on every-frakking-thing!  I blushed my eyelids, my cheekbones, my nose, my forehead, my chin and even my chest where cleavage would have been had I ever had any and I discovered that if I put it on just right, I could create an illusion of larger breasts (or any breasts).  Aaand we are all done talking about boobs for today.
But, I did have that slightly sun burned look year round!  It was like fake tanning before fake tanning existed.  See?  I was just ahead of my time, is all!

By fourteen, I had begun to do this little experimental thing where I mixed powdered eyeshadow (the kind you were supposed to apply with a tiny spongy thing) with chapstick to create a creme makeup.  I had a whole brush set I'd picked up for myself at the drug store and you would have thought it was like a new paint brush set for an artist.  I fricken loved that brush set.  It was a strange blue that was sort of between a sky blue and a turquoise.

I still had one of those brushes left a few years ago but it was lost or thrown away sometime in the last 3 years.  Anyway, I put that newly invented chapstick infused makeup creme stuff on my lips and my eyelids.  It made for a lipstick that would last all frakking day long and if I used lip liner with it, it held in place through eating, drinking and even smoking.
But on my eyes, I found it caked a bit too much and would seem to gather in my crease by the end of the day so I opted to go back to just a powder for eyeshadow.

I experimented with all different kinds of looks.  I used blue mascara, green eyeshadow and orange blush.  Don't judge, it was the Eighties!  One of my teachers made fun of me one day when I used concealer on the edges of my mouth and put my lipstick creation stuff only in the middle of my lips.  I kind of looked like a Chinese bride-child.  I don't recall which teacher it was so it wasn't one of those "You've scarred me for life" moments.  Just kinda pissed me off enough to make me never forget.

Moving right along.  My makeup became much more natural looking as I got into my later teen years.  I opted for brown eye liner, brown mascara, brown lipstick, brown hued eyeshadow and a blush that was brown with rose undertones.  But I did put hydrogen peroxide in my hair to make it more blonde and less red.  Go figure!

Then I got into my late teens and started wearing less and less makeup.  By the time I was twenty, I didn't wear makeup at all anymore.  Around twenty-five, I added back a little bit of eyeliner and mascara but it didn't last but maybe six months.  I've hopped on and off the makeup train about once every five years ever since.

Lately, I've been feeling my girly side trying to come out more.  So I contacted a friend and she's sending me some makeup to try out.  I discovered there really are makeups now that are made of a kind of creme and what do you know!  They don't contain chapstick.  Weird!

So, I guess we'll see what happens when this try-out makeup arrives.