All Is Vanity

I was at the gym last night, which is still a very odd thing for me to hear myself say. In February, I joined a gym for the first time in my life. But, you reach that point when you actually care about cholesterol and rapid at-rest heart rates and losing the weight you can no longer deny you've gained. So, "typical" gym members are still novel to me. In my class last night, I saw a woman who was at least ten years older than me. And, shockingly to me, she had her bleached hair in a Chrissy-from-Three's Company side ponytail, wore a rhinestone hairband, and her outfit had a pattern that looked like--surely not?--My Pretty Pony. I wanted to grab her shoulders, force her to look in the wall mirror, and tell her, "Honestly, it's not a good look for you!"



Not too long ago, I ran into a local man I'd met before. It had been about two years since I'd last seen him and now I was in a checkout line behind him. At least, I thought it was him. It was weird. The person in front of me, based on his profile, both looked like and unlike the person I thought he was. Then, he turned around and smiled at me, "Hi, Karla! How have you been?" Well, I know I had to have been wide-eyed for a moment. He looked like he'd gone to a plastic surgeon with a 1990's photograph of Jon Bon Jovi and told the doctor, "Here. Make me look like him." Again, someone older than me now had Jon Bon Jovi's lips, nose, and highlighted Jovi-esque hair...he even wore Jovi-colored contacts. But, none of the individual parts seemed to fit the shape of his face. It was so very strange and there was nothing on his face I could comfortably look at while talking with him. (And, yes, in case you're wondering, I believe it's highly unlikely either of these people would read this blog.)



What is going on? Throughout history, people have always tried to improve their looks and maintain a somewhat youthful appearance. But, I'm beginning to feel like there's a whole generation of What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? look-alikes out there, thinking they look great. I suppose the primary question is: What is the goal of injections of toxins and potentially dangerous surgeries? To fool other people into thinking you're twenty years younger than you are? Okay, but to what end?



The usual answer lies in a deep fear of mortality. The longer you can keep old age at bay, the longer you'll live. There could be a kind of delusional hopefulness that if you look young, you really are young. You can pretend death is not inevitable. Sadly, I suspect it may be more shallow than that. I think there are people who have seen their looks as their main asset for so long, they may not have developed many other gifts or talents. If their looks fade, so do they. And that, admittedly, would be a terrifying prospect.



I look back on what I looked like when I was in my late teens and early twenties and I think I looked a little...vapid. Part of me would love to be 115 lbs. again and have a completely smooth face.I also look back on who I was then. I was never pretty enough to have been truly conceited, but there were times when I was smart enough that I became, regrettably, a little arrogant. Even though I'd paid the price for that over and over again and have fully learned that lesson, it saddens me a little. I'm grateful that I now have real humility, genuine compassion for others, and wisdom resulting from years of experience. Those are three traits I'm sure my 115 lb. self would not have thought about too much.



So, do I want to be younger? Would I like to be my reckless, headstrong, prone-to-bad-decisions self again? No, not really. I'd rather look at people and the world through eyes that have learned important things through the years, even if those eyes bear a few well-earned lines.