Beauty Play

"Beauty is in the eyes of the beholder,"
at the Christian LaCroix Runway Show

When I was in fourth grade at Immaculate Conception, I really wanted to play the role of Mary in the school's annual Christmas play. I could sing, dance, look piously upon the Baby Jesus, and rock that costume.The nun in charge of our music and theater program had passed me over for the prized role the previous year. Her standards were mysterious, as it seemed by my calculation that I 'measured up' on all counts.
   
After the last year's disappointment, I mustered enough courage to ask "why not me?"

Sister Angelle looked down with her best you-know-I'm-right countenance and said, "you're a brunette and everyone knows our Mary is blonde."

What? Your Mary is a blonde? My mind flipped wildly through limited biblical knowledge: Mary and Joseph leave Nazareth on a donkey for a rocky ride to Bethlehem to be counted with other Jews. They were born in the Middle East. Joseph is a senior brunette. What am I missing here? You don't want me for this role because your ideal of virtuous is blonde?
   
I remember feeling ugly before this confrontation, but at that moment, I was ashamed of eyes like coals, curly chestnut hair, and khaki skin. By the time I was twenty-five, I launched a full blown frontal attack on my appearance: short stature, fleshy thighs, square feet, flimsy nails, American Indian nose, prominent leg veins, short neck, and hair that frizzes in humidity. When a friend of mine stated flatly, "we need longer toes for great foot cleavage in stilettos," I became convinced that beautiful was the search for the Holy Grail.

Abruptly, the fashion industry shifted 'ideal women’ to unconventional: crooked noses, electrifying halos of crimped hair, sunken chests, and heroin-addict circles under the eyes. I got it. This beauty thing was a moving target, arbitrary, contextual, and fabricated by Madison Avenue salesmen as capricious as Sister Angelle's standards of perfection.

I decided to go with what I had. I needed to define my beauty, not theirs. If I shape myself to please someone else, I abandon the core of who I am. As I type this story, I look down at my sixty-six year old hands at the computer keys. They are the threshold into an oozy slide, to the invisible stage of womanhood. With some savings, I could fix a saggy chin, the upper arm sway, thicker belly, gray hair, roadway map thighs, the whatever-else-is-not-in-style-for-the-moment beauty. But, I'd rather work on what's inside and have something to say.

Love what you see in the mirror right this very minute. You've only got one life and you can waste it wanting to be a young blonde virgin mother, or you can embrace what you have and direct your attention to all that is real and lasting. It's a beautiful world that you can own on your own terms. This is one thing you can change.