Column: Something About Nothing

“Age should not have its face lifted, but it should rather teach the world to admire wrinkles as the etchings of experience and the firm line of character.”

That is a statement by Clarence O’Day. I do not know who Clarence O’Day is, but I agree with this statement about wrinkles. I certainly must have a lot of experience and a firm line of character because when I looked in the mirror one day I didn’t recognize the face that stared back at me. The saggy skin and the wrinkled lines and old acne scars appeared to have changed me into someone I did not recognize.

It didn’t help that I lost weight. It seemed to accentuate the wrinkles. I have a friend that resides in an area nursing home. She frequently refers to her home jokingly as the wrinkle factory. We seem to be concerned about our wrinkles as we get older even though they are a progression in life.

I suppose I could have plastic surgery, but there are a few problems with my having a little nip and tuck. One is that nips and tucks come with a cost, and if I nip and tuck the strain on my pocketbook would suck. Then there is the little thing about fear of surgery and the possibility that my smile one day would go away. Occasionally plastic surgery ends up with plastic faces.

I decided to try the easy way out. I listened to Dr. Oz and his face-tightening suggestions with creams. I tried one of his suggestions, which is a popular inexpensive store brand. It was a night cream that was supposed to plump up those lines. I woke in the morning, and my whole face was plumped. It looked like a balloon. Apparently my skin and the product’s ingredients had done battle during the night.

I decided to opt for some home remedies. Who would have thought at my age that I would still have problems with blackheads? I read that combining two parts olive oil to one part mineral oil would help. You massage it into your face and then you steam a cloth and put it on your face until it cools. It felt pretty good. It kind of worked if you didn’t do it too often. I think I got carried away a little and used it too often. I came to that conclusion when my skin started shedding and I turned pink, which any other time would be my favorite color.

I love all the natural tips that I get in my magazines. I have finally found a few products that seem to be working for me.

One is a product that is inexpensive and is a product Dr. Oz actually recommended from the L’Oreal Paris family. It is supposed to lift and it does. Unlike the Playtex bra, it lifts but doesn’t separate.

The other product is plain old Vaseline for a moisturizer at night. I have to be careful that my face doesn’t slide off my pillow right onto the floor.

One night I tried a pore-tightener do-it-yourself treatment from Prevention magazine. It was simple. Whip an egg white and brush it unto your face and then take one-ply tissue and plaster it to your face, wait 20 minutes and peel it off. I did this while the male half of my household was out golfing. He came home to a wife with a tissue wrapped face. He was speechless I suspect on purpose so he wouldn’t laugh. I have to tell you the skin felt pretty good after that.

I may joke about my wrinkles, but I can’t imagine remembering both my grandmas looking any other way. I can’t imagine my Grandma Young without wrinkles. I loved her wrinkles. I loved her character. She was in her 80s when she left us and what I remember most is her smiles and, yes, her wrinkles. Both my grandmas’ wrinkles added character to their faces.

I don’t know what kind of wrinkles my grandma had in her heart. I would suspect she knew fixing the wrinkles inside her heart or accepting them is what made her happy and smiling on the outside for those she loved.

I encourage you to work on the wrinkles on the inside and not worry about the wrinkles on the outside. If you must work on those outside wrinkles, don’t ask for my advice because my methods have not worked.

I am going to keep trying the weird natural remedies that I have heard about. They might not work; in fact, they might have the opposite effect since the way I look when I try some of them is so ridiculous I can’t stop laughing. Oh, but then they are not wrinkles, they are laugh lines. What could be better?

 

Wells resident Julie Seedorf’s column appears every Monday. Send email to her at thecolumn@bevcomm.net.