calimary
calimary's JournalMan! I got lured in, too, when I was that age.
They showed us a video by their then-marquee name, actor Steven Boyd.
It sounded interesting and pretty harmless for about three or four minutes. Then I started getting the creeps.
I got the hell outta there when they tried to make me sign a "promissory note" to pay them $35.
Remember what Mad-Eye Moody always warned Harry Potter -
"CONSTANT VIGILANCE!!!!"
These assholes NEVER give up. Which means - NEITHER CAN WE!!!!
Yeah, I know what you mean about "simply letting gravity take charge."
Every time I find myself looking in the bathroom mirror and pulling my checks back a little to tighten things up, INVARIABLY I'll see an older woman in the neighborhood, just a few minutes later, who's had too much work done. The skin is artificially tight over the old facial bones, sometimes it's shiny and too ruddy in spots. Sometimes you can see very tiny, fine broken capillaries in the cheeks. It just doesn't make sense. Maybe in the first few months after a facelift you're fine, but time marches on and your skin elasticity starts to give way again, and then you start looking like some strange bird-ish gargoyle. So, how ever much I was tempted, that temptation was short-lived. And hey, if I'm too busy and too cheap to stay on top of my spreading gray/white roots every six weeks like you're supposed to, how on earth would I ever keep up with something like that?
When I was a reporter, one of the things we covered every year, along with events like the Oscars and stuff, was the American Film Institute tribute to some leading Hollywood light, who was given a lifetime achievement award because he or she usually had a LOOOOONNNNG list of accomplishments spanning many years - to earn the right to be an honoree. The AFI tributes always brought out Old Hollywood. MAN we would see such eye-brow-raising raised eyebrows and other assorted eye lifts! And facelifts. And chin lifts. Male and female versions. And neck jobs and boob jobs, toupees and hair transplants. You name it. We always had fun with this one, in the press area along the red carpet which is where you covered the arrivals. Always made me think it just wasn't worth it to have to keep pouring all that money down a bottomless pit of surgical upkeep. 'Cause regardless whatever work you had done - then you have to maintain the damn thing so you don't start getting saggy again and you stay pert and perky-looking. Costs a bundle or three. And eventually it just doesn't work anymore. For example, I think Demi Moore has taken it as far as it'll go without just totally blowing it. Which is really a shame! She was simply glorious-looking when she was younger!!! On the other hand, I just saw Judy Colllins in a PBS clip, with her white hair pinned up in a bun. She's gotta be, I dunno, in her 60s or even maybe 70s (?) and she IS glorious-looking!!!
I think it was on the "M*A*S*H" TV show that one of the characters was talking about a woman with
a wrinkly neck. Something like - "she's got such a crepe-y neck she has to hide during Thanksgiving!" 
Btw - I actually enjoyed the white hairs that went "SPROINNNGGGG!" from my scalp while the rest of the hair was still dark brown. They caught the light really nicely - and sometimes it looked like I had strands of silver in my hair - as though I'd spent a lot of time in the ol' salon. Too cheap to do that back then, though.
Well, I live under my own personal white haystack!
I hope you stay that way, facially. My skin is just now starting to give up the ghost. But when it does, my skin and I both will be hiding under my hair!
Jonathan Winters once said - "sure beats the ol' dirt nap!"
I interviewed him once, when I was still working. That quip just stuck like glue - I thought it was the greatest thing! And as I age, it has new meaning for me every day. We had a neighbor across the street who had her own version of it - "any problem on this side of the dirt can be fixed."
A step ahead of both of you. I turned 60 a few months ago.
I never looked my age before. Until lately. Mercifully, my skin's been great throughout, with very few wrinkles that are easy to spot.
But since I turned 60, all of a sudden - who the hell is that looking back at me in the mirror? Fuck!!! What's with that neck????????? (I believe the late great Nora Ephron wrote a whole book on that kind of thing...)
I also have just recently lost about 40 pounds. That plump neck that was a diagonal line from the tip of my chin down to the notch in my neck has now shriveled. I now have a discernible jaw line once again, but shit!!! There's this saying among women (certainly fits men, too, of course) that as you age you have to choose between your face and your ass. Well, thereya go. My face is not winning anymore. Btw - my husband and I are on the same diet, and it seems he's had to choose between his gut and his ass - Holy Cow, the deflation!!!
I remember during the reagan years, Nancy complained about her much-snickered-about fat ankles. She also said she exercised as much as she could but it didn't seem to make much difference anymore. And she was in her 60s at that time. Hated her husband but as far as that aspect, I did feel for her!
On the other hand, I finally gave up on my hair. It's been wanting to turn white since I was in college. For a long time I plucked out the offending hairs but soon it became a race I couldn't win anymore. So I started having it colored - a little lighter with highlights overall, sort of a mask-and-distract strategy. But I wouldn't be able to make time for regular hair appointments - which, with what I needed, quickly became way too expensive both in dollars and time squandered. Three or four hours at a shot! I have thick, heavy hair so it always takes me longer. I'd go so long between appointments that I'd start looking like an interstate highway with the gray roots rushing in. Finally gave up. My hair's gone all white. It's been fun! I took a photo with two longtime friends who are Latino and very dark-skinned. They're both shorter than I am. It looked like they were two normal people standing on either side of the abominable snowman!
The only advantage: unlike with my face - I absolutely LOVE my hair! Shoulda done that 30 years ago!!! Maybe my answer will be - growing out the bangs all the way and just hiding under it all the time! I'll look like a bleached-out Cousin It.
Btw - be sure you're taking your calcium/magnesium and glucosamine/condroitin supplements!
Aging sure isn't for the faint of heart.
In general, it's a VERY worthwhile question.
As a woman who feels that her body is now under siege in many parts of this country, I think it's an extremely valid question.
Shit! Every time I see those stars 'n' bars, my teeth start grinding.
I'm as white as can be, but I find that symbol incredibly offensive!!! I find that whole statement incredibly bewildering and disgusting. When you're WEARING that incendiary crap ACROSS YOUR FREAKIN' FACE, I'm sorry but you deserve what you get. You're just trying to inflame people and stir things up. And when you do, don't be surprised and don't whine if you're "unfairly" treated by the media. You sure look like a racist to me!
I find myself losing patience with people who just try to stir things up for the sake of stirring things up. There seems to be no other reason for him doing this. BORING!!!! TIRESOME as hell! And um, yes. RACIST. If the mask fits, pal, wear it.
And this guy's pal/apologist, the Kentucky Pipsqueak, is the same guy to whom Medea Benjamin wants to hand-deliver valentines????????????
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Gender: FemaleHome country: USA
Current location: Oregon
Member since: 2001
Number of posts: 81,238
