Pretty Like Mommy

I guess I was about 5 years old.

I was in trouble for being particularly bratty one day.

I wanted to get back in my Mom's good graces, so I stood in the bathroom doorway watching her preparing for her nightly beauty routine.

My Mom was the perfect female role model for an aspiring Primp Queen like me.

With her perfect skin, high cheekbones, chocolate-colored pixie hairstyle and red lipstick, I wanted to be just like her.

I stood there watching, hoping she would talk to me. She looked over and said "Do you want to learn how to wash your face?"

I shook my head yes.

"Ok, come here," She said and motioned for me to stand on the step stool.

"First, we must pull our hair back," She said and handed me a head band.

Then came...wait for it....Ready?

Noxema!

Yes, the good old blue jar of Noxema, remember it?!

We both walked around with our fantastic menthol scented facial treatments and I felt so amazing!

It tingled and was doing something. Really doing something! I could feel it working, making me beautiful like my Mom.

It was a true bonding moment and I dare say my very first primping memory.

Ok, confession: sometimes I go to Walgreens and buy Noxema just so I can smell it and remember those magical moments of beauty bliss with my Mom.

We just talked this morning, laughing about this. :)

My poor Mom endured my obsession with beauty products that started at a very young age.

Once, I was with my Dad in a grocery store and a woman walked up and said "Well, aren't you a cute little boy?"

Boy?

Cute little BOY?

I was so horrified and humiliated that I when we got home I told my Mom and begged her to let me get my ears peirced.

I made a solemn inner vow that this mistake will NEVER happen again.

I was all girl.

Girl. Girl. Girl. Girl. Girl.

Being mistaken for a boy? Seriously?

Back in the day, you went to a doctor and they used a needle to peirce ears.
It hurt so bad, not only when they first stab you, but for weeks following.

I had to sleep in the earrings, and every morning my Mom would help me clean the encrusted blood. They needed to be cleaned with rubbing alcohol and put back into my ears.

Ohhh, the stinging and the burning. They throbbed.

But I didn't care. I was in the first grade when I learned to suffer for beauty!

My Mom would say "I'm sorry it hurts, honey, but we have to make sure to clean them."

I didn't care. She could have stabbed me in the eyeball with them.

Those tiny gold balls were my insurance policy that nobody would ever call me a boy again.

And from there, my primping only got amped up.

More to follow at another time.

I have to go now, Army Wives is on.

:)