Am I losing touch?

Am I losing touch? Have I spent too long in the country? Last week I went to the city for lunch with a friend who now lives in the Lake District. It wasn't precisely a halfway house, but meeting in Manchester worked for both of us.

Having become a jeans and fleece sort of a girl, I really did try to make a bit of an effort. I shaved my legs, I put a skirt on and a pair of boots which last year made me feel like the bees' knees. I couldn't quite be bothered with the whole hair straighteners rigmarole but I bashed it for a while with a hairbrush and put on some make up and left feeling really quite smart. When I stopped in the village to buy a paper my friend in the newsagent said "Oh, where are you off to then?" so it clearly showed.

I parked my car in the gulp inducingly expensive carpark at Kendals (a sort of smaller, Northern version of Harrods for those who have never heard of it) and found I had half an hour to kill before meeting S so I thought I would have a quick whizz round in case I could manage to start my Christmas shopping, startlingly early for me.

And the whole thing was dreadful.

First I caught sight of myself unexpectedly in a shop mirror and had the classic experience of wondering who that fat, miserable old bat was before realising it was me. I can't even say I looked like my mother as my mother looks loads better. I just looked ancient and slightly scruffy.

In a panic I flew to the ladies' and put some lipstick on and attacked the hair again. Now I didn't look quite so ancient but as I was putting the hairbrush away three girls came in who make me feel I had wandered into an alien world. Each was deeply tanned and highly blonded, with the straight glossy hair and glossy lips of a television presenter or a female X factor judge. Each wore heels so high that they towered above me (and I am middling, not short) and each examined her reflection in the mirror so minutely that they might have been looking for hairs unplucked or pores unsqueezed. They carried handbags loaded with chains and quilting and colour. They were dressed, at eleven thirty on an autumn morning, in tiny shiny dresses, tied under the bust and short enough to display miles of leg of varying degrees of beauty or sturdiness.

They looked like pictures in Grazia. They looked as if they were trying to be Cheryl Cole. They made me feel utterly out of place and uncomprehending. I would not have looked like that even when I could have done and I fled, wondering what had happened to the feminism which sought to abolish the idea of women as sex objects. As far as I can see all that has happened is that young men are now also fair game and are thus becoming as obsessed with their looks as women once were. A form of equality I suppose.

I wandered out into the store. I am not a great shopper but Kendals is as good as it gets generally, not too huge, lots of choice, things which shout "quality" or "expensive" depending on your mood. And perhaps it was my mood that made every rail a shuddering obscenity: shirts for toddlers at £60, hideous versions of those handbags for hundreds, shoes you could not walk in for a month's salary, a child's bed for the price of a small car.

I pushed out of the store and fell gratefully into Waterstones - ordinary looking people, piles of books, yes, a business, but one that made more sense to me, that didn't make me feel queasy with excess. And then I met my friend and the hours flew by as we drank too much coffee and stayed and stayed and laughed and were serious and laughed again.

Have I spent too long in the country?

Comments

  1. Nah, it's not about the country, I don't think. The girls my daughter's age seem like aliens to me sometimes. I always cleaned up nicely and attracted male attention, but my goodness, these girls look like something out of a magazine. It's as if they are taught something new, something that passed us by. And frankly, being of a certain age doesn't help a whit!

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  2. I know what you mean. Two years in the country have removed any semblance of city slicker that I may have gained. Although I'm excited about my move to San Francisco, I'm dreading the getting dressed for it part. Am hoping the women there don't look like the girls you describe. I'm not sure I'm ready to be written off quite yet, but they sound very high maintenance - where do they find the time or money? And how do they walk in those shoes?

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  3. We do say round here, when we gather for anything more celebratory than sheep shearing, 'Don't we scrub up well?'

    And we do - we all look clean and presentable and perfectly lovely. What we lack is that metropolitam gloss you describe so well.

    I'm not sure it really matters - I feel now, (after far to many years dieting, sucking in my tummy and squeezing feet into not-sensible shoes) far happier in my skin, far more confident. The French have a phrase for it but my country brain has temporarily forgotten what it is.

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  4. No way! country is where it's all at. things that matter most.

    I can only wish I was 5'10" and 115lbs but oh well. I guess i will stick with my 5'3" 1** well, I guess i wont tell that much.

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  5. There will always be someone slimmer, fatter, richer, poorer, regular, sophisticated. It is all just relative. If you are happy in your daily life and the one you love is there with you, it doesn't get any better.
    QMM

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  6. I know how you feel Elizabeth but worry not, you live in the best place, in the real beautiful world. I feel out of place when I go back to what I call the Otherworld and could never live there again.
    I am showing my age now perhaps but I always think these young women look far more attractive without all the slap etc and what gets me is that they all look boringly the same don't they?

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  7. I've only ever lived in the country and so have never had any city slickness at all. I know exactly what you mean though. I go to places like Kendalls to laugh incredulously. As I also did at one such girl I encountered. She was bright orange - what passes as a 'tan' - she looked like something from another planet.

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  8. Well if you have then I have...and personally (as someone who hasn't owned a lipstick since they were 15) I am not in the slightest bit worried. I'd rather be accepted ion our village, as I am, looking as I do, then in the parallel universe I ocassionally glimpse when I go to *Town*.

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  9. Welcome to my world! Having just gone back to the Uk for a few days I am home in France and still reeling from the expereince. So much conspicious consumption so much bare flesh and do people really need all those clothes and all that makeup? I am happier being me in the country here than I could ever be in a city nice place to visit but so glad I don't live in one!

    oh and the loud harsh voices too! AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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  10. I had exactly the same experience when I went back to Llangollen for my daughter's wedding..we flew into Manchester and also went shopping!!Horrendous time!! Where is everybody getting the money from to spend on such irrelevant, over-priced tat!!
    Stay in Denbigh, feet on the ground, watching the seasons, much better..and will make you happier and healthier.

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  11. That's Manchester for you - or Leeds, or any city with aspirations. I think I look just fine in the town but when I go to the city I feel clonkingly be-Barboured.

    And anyway, their legs would be cold and goosepimply within minutes of stepping out of the shops!

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  12. I'm not reading the other comments before I start - so apologies if I repeat other people's thoughts - but I would say, it is not a case of you spending too much time in the country, rather the other way round. The city is such a false, fake environment, by very definition. You don't have to get wet or cold in the city, you can just hop out of a taxi into Kendals and into another to go for lunch and so on, you can easily lose touch with the elements and everything that makes life real. As you know I live only 3 miles from Manchester city centre and work there twice a week, yet I do feel separate from it and observe it rather than feel a part of it, really. Kendals is awful actually, it is a kind of microcosm of rich thoughtlessness where Corrie actors shop (and my ex-husband)... there are lots of other much nicer bits of Manchester! I am rambling now, but the main point is, you are 'you', and you probably don't entirely fit anywhere... bits of you here, bits there, not perfect as none of us are... don't try to measure up to WAGS in posh shops, they may look perfect but could they run a holiday cottage or walk Offa's Dyke or make a beautiful garden and keep hens? I think not. If I had seen you on Deansgate I'd have thought 'who is that interesting looking woman'... Be you, Elizabeth! And next time you are in town come and see us at Chethams! If it's a Weds or Fri I'll be there :-)

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  13. Kim - the thing that puzzles me is that my two beautiful daughters don't look like this, so it isn't a generational thing.
    Eliane - will be fascinating to see how it is in San Francisco. Hope you will be blogging about it.
    Mountainear - I do know what you mean, the phrase is something about being comfortable in your own skin, and I am very much so these days!
    Flowergirl - yes, I agree, country is the place to be.
    QMM - I am very happy with my life so don't look at this with any envy whatsoever, it is more a bemusement. When did this happen? and more to the point, why?
    Cait - I do agree that this look produces something where they all look the same!
    PM - alien is about it.

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  14. I don't think it has anything to do with the country at all - age (ie maturity!), maybe, and being more comfortable with yourself, no longer being in a work/socialising environment where looks and clothes say more about you than you'd like or than is necessarily true. Add to that the very distorted values and self-image that many young people have forced on them now, and the herd instinct of city dwellers, and it's no wonder we feel different. Be thankful that we are free to be as we are, sez I! (And I live in a city where those tanned, leggy, half-naked youngsters are everywhere! I and my age group look reassuringly like you though....)

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  15. No you haven't. I think it's elements of the town and of a different generation that have changed beyond all recognition. I went into Cambridge recently and visited John Lewis. Thankfully I was spared your rather horrifying ladies experience but everything was on sale in such piles, so excessively arranged and rather highly priced. I was offended. I loved shopping when I was suited up and earning a proper wage - sometime I used to spend a little too much but I think living a smaller life has taught me that much of the stuff on sale is unnecessary. Perhaps I have become a hair shirt. Thank goodness for your lovely-sounding meeting with your friend. The perfect antidote.

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  16. PG - parallel universe is just how it feels, another world all together.
    HaH - I missed out the voices, you are right, shrieking out across the street.
    Jude - I agree, I think it is happier and healthier here. Not too much scope for rampant consumerism in Denbigh and Mold!
    Kitty - yes to the goosepimply legs, but I suppose you can't see that from a distance!
    Sue - I love your phrase "a microcosm of rich thoughtlessness". Perfect.

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  17. My teenagers take forever to get ready to go anywhere and always look so much nicer than myself but I have to say I'm more comfortable with myself and I'm not dressing for others. I hate shopping for my teenagers because the clothing is so "adult" and something I wouldn't have ever worn at their age. Just try to find a prom dress that doesn't look like it should be on a Vegas show girl and their shoes all look as if they are from the Frederick's of Hollywood catalogue. It hasn't anything to do with country but with what our youth are being pushed to dress in. I'd love to smack some of the designers for youth clothing for trying to sell sex with our girls.

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  18. No it's not the country - it's being your own boss - being relaxed, being comfortable. If you hadn't bothered at all you might have looked, in a curious way, more natural. I only say this because I have exactly the same experience, working away in sweater and jeans and perhaps a gilet if it's cold but then feeling I need to get dressed up to go to M and S or John Lewis and then having just the same mirror wincing experience. Of course the bright lights don't help.
    For clothes that look quite respectable at home suddenly look as though they had come unpressed from a pile of jumble under the bright arc lights or M and S. I think we are all in much the same boat. Getting older doesn't do one many favours either, except that you cease really to care any more what people think.

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  19. As ever, you write how I feel Elizabeth. I know I have spent too long tucked away either in my home or in my sewing room and struggle sometimes to feel right just standing at the school gates, as though I have emerged from another world entirely. Most odd x

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  20. Well, as someone who lives in a huge city along with a huge variety of folks, I do want to say how much I loved reading this post and the one that immediately preceded it.

    I so long for the possibility of a life away from the city, yet realize that staying here is in many ways easier. New York has room for all sorts of esthetics ... we have folks who probably spend more on daily grooming that I do on weekly groceries. And folks who wish they could buy enough groceries for a week.

    Something about the mix is what interests me. It really can jolt one's mind to see who might be walking along the sidewalk just ahead of you.

    All the same, what could be more wonderful than to see wide open sky, green fields, perhaps a hill or hedge, listen to natures sounds, breath air without much carbon monoxide. Now that is a fabulous atmosphere.

    Physical health trumps decoration every time.

    Think I'd best stop this rambling right now. xo

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  21. I enjoyed reading everyones comments and just want to add that the country is the ONLY place to live. I'm barely in the country but hope in a few years to retire further out. My daughter and I are leaving for England this afternoon and are so looking forward to seeing the lovely countryside we see pictures of. Can't wait! Love reading your blog Elizabeth and feel quite envious sometimes. Just remember you have what so many people only dream of.(as you once did).And my goal at this time of my life is to just feel comfortable in my own skin, I still struggle sometimes but I know it is also a journey.

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  22. I know exactly how you felt! I have been there countless times and crept out of town with my unfashionable tale between my legs. Then I get home and I realise that what I care about is here, and that what I wear doesn't define who I am. Most of the time that makes me feel better. Otherwise cake works well. I think you are fab so forget the Cheryl Coles out there and enjoy being you!

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  23. Oh my goodness, Elizabeth - I know that feeling SO WELL. A kind of cross between slight depression and incomprehension. What is it with these tangoed young women? Do you think they will ever be able to grow old gracefully or will they have to enter into some kind of pact with Dr Botox and spend the rest of their lives in some kind of twilight world of cosmetic surgery and nightclub rest rooms? Yuck - give me a pair of old jeans and a fleece any day.

    (Gosh, I don't know that I'm looking like my mother yet, but I'm certainly sounding like her...)

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  24. The answer to your question elizabeth is "Probably." I know those feelings all too well. On the rare occasions I venture into a town I find it a great effort to put on a decent pair of tights, make up my face, put on my glad rags. Then when I get there I walk about as if in a dream - I don';t seem to inhabit that world any more. When I think of the effort I used to put into my appearance when I was a townie. Oh dear - I identify exactly with what you say.

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  25. Rachel - I do agree that many young people have a distorted self image, but as I say, it is not inevitable! My daughters certainly don't suffer from tango syndrome and neither do their friends. As you say, good to be in our own skin.
    Silverpebble - I see you pick up on the rampant consumerism! We are living in a time which seems to see consumption as the answer, without being any happier as far as I can see, perhaps even less so.
    Cathy - I do so agree about the sexualisation of children and teenagers and the inappropriate clothing. This was happening to some degree when my kids were young but has accelerated in the last ten years I think.
    Fennie - ah, now there is something very particular in the lights at M&S! They have always made me look dreadful!
    Pipany - that is a good phrase for it, emerging from another world. That is just how I feel.

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  26. Frances - I do know what you mean about cities and sometimes the energy of a city is just magic. I suspect the ideal is country with the odd shot of city, or vice versa!
    HI Linda and thanks for visiting. Hope you enjoy your visit to the UK. Make sure you see Wales as well as England, and Scotland and Ireland too of course! How long have you got?
    Welsh girl - thank you dear heart, and I you too! I suppose I think they are the odd ones and I am normal, always my basic point of view.
    Brown Dog - well exactly, you must commit yourself to a life time of hyper maintenance which after a while just gets sad doesn't it? I am with you on the jeans and fleece.
    Weaver - it is like going to a strange country sometimes isn't it? Not always, theatres and galleries and bookshops tend to be ok. It must have been the shop that attracted the tangoed ones!

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  27. Don't think it is living in the county Elizabeth. I have always been a town or city dweller but the whole glamming yourself up experience has always left me cold. As long as you are happy in your own skin that is all that matters. Are you sure that fat, miserable old bat in the mirror wasn't me ? :)

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  28. First, I have to tell you that your banner photo is absolutely gorgeous. I could stare at it for quite a while!

    And if that photo is any indication of where you live...in the country...then maybe you HAVE been there too long, but who cares! It's obviously the best place to be!

    I recall in my youth thinking the "old folks" were so out of touch. Well, I'm one now, and I do feel out of touch, or in a different world, when encountering situations like you describe so well here. There was a time when I could have looked like those girls, though I didn't, being way too shy and awkward socially. It seems to me that you are settled quite comfortably into your wonderful life and that is also what I'm doing. We may not be what the world idolizes these days, and perhaps that's a good thing. I think it is anyway.

    I always enjoy your posts. Thanks for sharing your world with us.

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  29. Me again...just checking the "email follow up box" which I forgot to do when I commented.

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  30. No, it sounds like you spent too long in Manchester! I went to Cheltenham the other week. I felt seriously underdressed there in the middle of the afternoon too.

    I've just seen your Tweet (sorry, I was being nebby) re Wordpress vs Blogger. I use both, there's pluses and minuses to each of them and from my experience of both of them, it really depends on what you want to do with your blog which makes the difference as to which one's best...

    Email me if you'd like to discuss it a bit more...

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  31. I read some of the comments to your post first.

    It is really interesting to see how many people say 'it's the countryside where it's at', the countryside which matters and which is the preferred place of living when only a very small percentage of the population of the UK actually lives outside towns and cities. And the majority of the people living in the countryside is retired. And, a personal and very limited survey carried out by me here at Valley's End found that the majority of young people say "there's nothing here for us".

    I think I must also have been the only dissenting voice in the comment section of your last countryside post. I really don't mean to spoil your enjoyment of life in the country.

    I could either visit but not comment at all or say what I really think. What would you rather have?

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  32. Anna - thank you. I agree, I suspect it is a cast of mind more than a place to live.
    Sara - I think my thought was that this sort of look was not current at all when you and I could have done it!
    VP - thanks, I have emailed you. I would appreciate your take on blogger etc.
    Friko - I didn't take your comment on my last blog to be a dissenting voice. I am very happy here. I would not dream of saying that my answer is everyone's, indeed I can tell from my own friends and family that it isn't, so to have someone point out that country life is not a bed of roses for all is totally fine by me! This blog was more about a shock at the "celebrityification" of young women in the way they look than a pro-country/anti-city rant. I think I might notice more coming from here than if I lived amongst it, but not necessarily. I very much want you to comment so I hope you will! My own position is much more grey and much more flexible than perhaps comes across.

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  33. Yes, you are losing touch with the city life.

    And you are happier for it.

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  34. Honestly, Elizabethm, I'm laughing WITH you, not AT you! How many times have I had that same shop window experience. Yikes! Who is that frumpy woman...oh no, it's me!
    Don't worry. You inhabit the real world and those poor girls are in a world to which no sanely mature person would ever return. I remember 'hot pants' and it isn't with any affection.

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  35. Yes, you've clearly stayed too long in the country. In fact, you seem to have stayed sooo long that you've begun thinking that rampant commercialism and vanity are bad things.

    Congratulations. :-)

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  36. No, Elizabeth - you're the one who's In touch! Like you, I'm delighted that my daughters aren't clones of some C-list sleb.

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  37. I haven't read all the comments but heck - I think it is more important to just be oneself no matter what others may think. Here in the country (40 years), we have three types of outfit: working scruffy - building and gardening; respectable but purposeful for mud and rain and shutting the hens in even if we have visitors; and our idea of 'chic' for smart visits in town or country, which definitely looks rural but is comfortable and I don't care what people think for I was never glamourous and haven't been able to wear makeup for 50 years. So there!

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  38. oh, how well i understand this post!
    those girls, for what it's worth, wouldn't know what to do inside a Waterstones.

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  39. I have just been reading both of your posts - I do agree with your sentiments. I read the Beauty Myth by Naomi Wolf many years ago, luckily when I was quite young, and it helped to free me from the tyranny of worrying about my appearance all the time. I feel great compassion for women who are obsessed like that - I don't think it ever brings them happiness or contentment, and the same goes for those obsessed with the latest in consumer 'must-haves'. All these things just seem to complicate life and imprison you on a treadmill of aspiration, whether you live in town or country. We live along a quiet country lane and my children have never been bored - they have learned how to amuse themselves, and have plenty of constructive outside interests - probably because hanging around in the road here would be boring! They have also learned to be cynical about the snares of consumerism and celebrity culture - possibly because I have been indoctrinating them since infancy!!

    Pomona x

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  40. You've struck a chord here. I felt like that when I went to London to visit an old friend. I felt so uncomfortable, SO out of place. But I didn't want to fit in. I could have never looked like a WAG or a chav or whatever those Grazia-types are, not would I have wanted to.
    The country, the beauty, the air, the pace of life gets into your soul. The last time I went to a major shopping centre I had to flee because I just felt so agoraphobic. It's the crowds I can't stand, that fear of not being able to escape. the heat, the prices, the falseness of it all. But give me the wide open space of a field and distant views and I'm fine.
    Love your top picture by the way.

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  41. No, you've not spent too long in the country.... the girls in the bathroom haven't spent long enough in the country!

    Hooray for the country life with its lack of pretension and real life living!

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  42. I was in Windsor recently, and at 2.30pm passed a young woman in the street who looked as though she was about to enter a nightclub. She was slightly orange, clingily dressed, made up to the nines, and altogether artificial in the bright afternoon light. Why???

    I think it comes down to a level of insecurity - to feel that you have to dress up to that pitch just to go shopping, well, in my book, that's just sad, and the media has a lot to answer for! How on earth are these young women going to cope when they start to get the odd wrinkle, 'spoil' their figures with children, get the odd brown spot on their hands, find that their teeth/eyes/etc etc are not as reliable and permanent as they once thought?
    Those of us over 50 were lucky enough, in the main, to grow up without image being all, and to give our appearances little thought, but today's 25yr old has already gone through more cosmetics and 'product' (hateful word) than I am likely to use in my entire life!
    I genuinely feel sorry for today's young women, and despite their opportunities, would not change places for anything.

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  43. Susan - well you are right, I am certainly happy for whatever reason!
    Pondside - ah, I thought I might not be alone in this!
    Moon - yes indeed, rampant consumerism was never my thing but my dislike of it has been intensified by being further away so that if anything it has more shock value than it used to.
    Chris - It can't be a generational thing can it, if both my daughters and yours haven't bought into it. I don't think it is a class thing either, or a money thing, seems to cut across all strata of society.
    WSC - I like your three types of outfit, suspect mine will fit into the same categories!
    Laurie - well I suppose you can pose anywhere!
    Pomona - hi. I have read your blog and nice to see you here! I think you are spot on about the indoctrination. I suspect my children have absorbed some of my attitudes, doubtless not all of them but looks like the anti consumerism and the anti Barbie doll gloss worked just fine.
    Maddie - you have it exactly, a combination of feeling out of place and not wanting to be in place if it means subscribing to that particular view of life.
    Teresa - yes, there is a lack of prentension here certainly, not enough money to allow for it perhaps!
    Lin - Hi and welcome. That did strike me too, how difficult it would be to age if you had set yourself such airbrushed standards of perfection. No wonder plastic surgery is becoming so much more popular in our looks obsessed society.

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  44. Ah, you always manage it. Always hit the button on the nose. What a wonderful piece of writing! As always you've described feelings and emotions so perfectly.
    But too long in the country? Nah, never. You look like a breath of fresh air...and you're real.

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  45. I am always clobbered up with FAT stuff in the way of clothing ....eg. cardigans, scarves, jackets....
    AND sometimes I walk round my city ( on the Rows, which I'm sure you know?) and I see teenagers etc wearing such THIN stuff ( "sundresse" in Winter??) and it makes me shiver...
    They must be made of iron!

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  46. No, no, you're the one who's right and (in that awful phrase that sets my teeth on edge), keeping it real! What is it with young women and those vertiginous heels? Every 'do' I've been to lately, all the the women have towered over me at the beginning of the evening but have shrunk by five or six inches at the end, as they've all taken off their torturous shoes.

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  47. Nah! Metropolitan gloss ( as Montainear says) wouldn't be you in a month of Sundays - just think of orange girl in heels trying to open your chicken shed .......:)

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  48. This post made me laugh so much Elizabeth - that it is only now I can return to write a comment. You, as ever have hit the nail on the head. After only 4 years back in Wales I am completely unable to cope with the experience you wrote about so well.

    Yes, you have been living in the country for too long, thank goodness.
    K

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  49. You've obviously struck a nerve with this one Elizabeth. No, it's not you, it's them!

    When I was at school, we all had bad haircuts, National Health glasses, crooked teeth and badly fitting clothes - not sure things have changed that much - but having worked in a senior school for the last four years I was constantly astonished at the appearance of the sixth formers.

    Lunch time was like a fashion show and much appreciated, too. Glossy hair, lovely straight teeth, legs and figures to die for and the clothes and make up! However, huge pressure on the girls to look good and compete at all levels comes at a price.

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  50. Paula - thank you, what a lovely thing to say!
    Jan - oh yes, I am very much a wearer of nice warm "fat stuff"! Hate being cold and blue.
    ATKT - the heels thing also ensures that you tower above anyone other than a six foot partner!
    SBS - Can't see them anywhere near my chicken shed to be honest.
    Karen - I am so glad you laughed. I was intending to be mildly amusing and was a bit taken aback when people assured me I was ok. I am afraid I had rather cheerily assumed that they had the problem, not me!
    Marianne - how nice to see you again. Hope things are well with you. You are so right about the pressure on girls today, boys too perhaps, but girls seem to be expected to meet absurdly high standards on all fronts, everything must be perfect which is a recipe for disaster.

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  51. I'm not sure where I wandered in from, but I recognise your world and that feeling of alienation from the glossy Grazia types!

    Mt teenage daughters have a quirky style all of their own - but I have NO idea where it popped up from (and am incredibly grateful they're not Grazia clones!).

    I'm more of the 'scrubbed up quite well' type!!!

    Thanks for a great blog :)

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  52. Ah, the 'chester tan - I believe Farrow & Ball are working it into their next colour chart and describing it as 'somewhere between tangerine and mahogany'...

    I am also rather isolated from the big city gloss, but I fear I'm far less accepting of the fact. It's not that I want to dress like a deranged X factor judge (I'm obviulsy not talking Simon or Louis in this context, lest you misunderstand) but I have been known to put on heels and vintage 1950s tea dresses to pick the kids up from school...

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  53. No one could spend too long in the country! You've just experienced what it feels like to go to a new school in your old uniform - very strange but soon overcome!

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  54. Glad Iam not the only one who wonders what planet those fancy women come from.Around here it's not just the 20 somethings, but women my age(40s) striving to look like stars. Movie star hair, expensive clothes, fancy make up,impossibly tiny figures, Botox...
    Next to them I look like some sort of wild, fuzzy, stout pony with burrs in my mane..oh well, it's all such hard work trying to be "perfect".
    Great post, struck a chord.

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