"Natural beauty takes at least two hours in front of a mirror" - Pamela Anderson
I BLEACH MY MUSTACHE.
There. I said it. It's true. It wasn't true until a month ago. But as I slathered on that Sally Hanson Creme Hair Bleach for the second time in my life today, I realized that this is now a very real and reoccurring part of my ridiculous and exhausting beauty regimen. I have a mustache. It isn't as bad as Liz Lemon's Tom Selleck but I will be damned if I am going to let the light ever catch a dark brown peach fuzz on my upper lip again.
They say we are our own worst critics. This is not true for me. I love me. And I take pride in who I am and what I look like. But, there have been a handful of times in my life when someone, without tact, points out some embarrassing detail about my face or body that I never noticed. I can never decide which is more embarrassing; the fact that I never noticed and now have to wonder how many other people noticed before this asshole, or the fact that any asshole ever even pointed it out...
Probably the former, otherwise, why else would I make adjustments in my daily routine to accommodate fixing such a criticism?
Anyway, the following is a discussion about the most embarrassing parts of my beauty routine that men just need to know. You do. Trust me. Because someday you will walk in on your future wife with a creme bleach fumanchu and wonder what the fuck happened to that perfect picture you met when you two began dating. I am here to ease the blow of such realizations.
So, chart-topper is the mustache that I bleach. My brother, so earnestly, turned to me a month ago and exclaimed "Hot damn! You have a mustache!" drawing my attention to a detail, I hadn't quite noticed about myself yet, but the sun must have been just right that afternoon. I promptly hopped in my car and hit up the Walgreen's that has been saving my ass for years to help me out again. Yeah, its weird to bleach it, but its more weird for me to let it go, really. I know a lot of women who wax theirs. You think shes just at the salon getting her nails done or her bangs trimmed, but what you don't know is that every single one of those establishments that you never go into has someone who knows how to make her crumb catcher disappear. Every two to six weeks she is in there, she is also getting her mustache waxed or bleached. I promise. Unless she is somehow graced by God and is chosen as a divine embodiment, she does it. It, of course, is most common in post-menopausal women of any background,but some of us come from a long line of evolution that didn't get the memo about feminine facial hair being out of fashion cerca 10,000 BC. I know the whole country of Italy is still waiting to get the verdict on whether or not God approves of its removal from the Vatican, but word is spreading there too. So, whether you like to admit it or not, women young and old alike bleach, pluck, wax, and make unknown their (what could be award winning) mustaches from their male counterparts. We are better at everything else, we can let you have facial hair.
Second on the list of things men don't realize about women is an issue that is actually one that is universal. Eyebrows. Yayse. Those caterpillars we keep on our faces would be rabid and untamed if we did not carefully sculpt them- or let the threading lady at the mall do it while we curse at her. I never knew my eyebrows, er should I say brow, was an issue until my vocal coach was prepping me for a show and trying out new mascaras on me and stopped everything to remedy the uni situation. The first tweeze is always the hardest, but after that, you hardly feel it at all. We women know you men tweeze occasionally too, and are very conscious of any unibrow situation, but what you may not realize is that my Frida Kahlo is out of control without some serious TLC. And to top it off, after i'm done plucking and shaping my arches, I then get the joy of coloring in those stupid spots unintentionally left bare with cream, powder, and pencil. You think these eyebrows are just magically on fleek? No. Patience and attention to detail.
You know that mole that Paula Abdul has on her left cheek? I have one too; same spot and everything. My mother always called it a beauty mark. Victoria in seventh grade called it a gross hairy mole. I bet you can guess how I took care of that situation. So, once every few months since I started plucking that too, one good fat hair pokes its head out of my Paula Mark and I get to tweeze that too. Those tweezers could take over the world if I would let them, but I need them, and they know it.
Hair removal is a big concern for women, not just on their faces either. A lot of work goes into carefully removing every hair from every follicle. I bet you guys forget that our armpits would look like yours if we didn't care so much about what you think about them. Trust us, if it weren't to impress a man, I would never shave my pits again, because every woman on the planet knows that it's a pain in the ass to remember to do that everyday. Yes, every day. Unlike leg hair that can take a few days vacation before ruining a good shower again, our armpit hair grows at an exponential rate. In the amount of time it has taken me to write this blog, I have had to shave my underarms twice. It is a ridiculous practice, and yet I do it... for you... you're welcome, future husband.
Legs, obviously, are shaven on a regular basis. That one is actually more for us women than you men. Who doesn't love the feeling of freshly shaved legs as your crawl into bed. Oh my god, it's like sleeping in satin sheets except its the same dirty sheets you've been sleeping in for a month, just satin legs. Mmm. I could touch them all night- but I wont, because I also love sleep.
A little farther north, however, isn't getting any hedge trimming if no one is on neighborhood watch. Let's be realistic here, for you men too, it's way more uncomfortable and itchy to keep that shit short and wait for it to grow back long enough just to get rid of it again. Amirite? I am. And men have it way easier than we do. Not only do most of you not even bother taming the ballfro, you don't have a plethora of pube-dos to choose from. The landing strip? The Bermuda Triangle? The polk-ya dot? Should we put in the work and give the down stairs a good old fashioned Captain Picard? Make it so. You guys have no idea how much work goes into it and how much we don't want to do the work. Like the pits, if it weren't for men, I wouldn't bother. Getting all up in there and making sure its all high and tight is a lot of work.
Now, I know at this point some men out there are going "I really don't mind if it's au naturale. I love a woman's body for what it is." You men, have clearly been in long-term committed relationships before in which women reached the point of "Take me as I am or don't take me at all." And, we all know which one men choose every time. You are so predictable. But, you can't tell me that if she had come out swinging, unkempt, and au naturale the first few times you fooled around or boned, that you would have come back for more. And if you still would have, you and her are both dirty hippies. Peace, love, and pubefros.
Since we are pros at body hair removal by the time we are 16, when most of you men are just sprouting your first whiskers, we have had more time to over analyze the smallest parts of our bodies- or in my case had someone else point out the over analyses for us. This, of course, includes our toes. How often do you think about your toes, men? Every time your stub them? That's it? Because every time, I take the razor from the pits all the way down to the ankles, I am already poised and prepared to strike those fuzzy little piggies on my feet. You bet your sweet ass I take a razor to those hobbit feet of mine and make sure I give the lady that does my pedicures a clean canvas to paint her little Mona Lisas. That one is for her. Not you. Not me. Her.
Now that we have examined every inch of the hairy feminine body together, I hope that you are not surprised when you get married and you walk into the bathroom to find your woman with bleach on her lip, waxing her legs, and Veeting her toes with a razor in her armpit. It is all out there now. No more secrets. Kiss her and tell her you love her and let her know she can let the ladybusiness go this time. You will have been together long enough. Take her as she is.
Now, if you'll excuse me, my armpits are back again.
