Beauty is Skin Peep?

I know life is getting better since I have stopped wearing any sort of (subtle or otherwise) make-up to office. There used to be a dependence on touch and glow. And then came a phase when calamine was the layer that would sort of let me get out in the morning. But of late, nothing…yes indeed…nothing and I have been able to get out without thinking that I may have to stand in the daylight and speak to someone long enough for them to analyse all my skin flaws… not like they’d care but anyway.

So much of what we are is derived out of the way we look. If my skin is bad (which has been the case since I landed in Mumbai and its been a long way downhill ever since), then I feel totally under-confident and very depressed. It’s terrible that I have to feel that way just based on the way I look. And it’s not just me, other women have these issues do.
I wonder if men have these problems…do they bother about the marks that zits leave and the tiny bumps they leave behind like a remembrance of sort. I don’t know. Maybe I don’t even care. Or maybe it’s because all the men I know have been bestowed by naturally clear skin.

I was on facebook the other day, whiling away time…what else does one do on facebook anyway? …so I was looking through albums of some friends and I saw some women with terribly bad skin…and I heaved a sigh of relief sending a little thank you to god saying that I am not alone. Well, in retrospect, that was a terrible reaction to have. I should have probably felt bad for them…instead I felt good for myself. Sigh. What tangled webs we weave… of self-obsession and insensitivity, of vanity and such insanity.

Anyway, so my skin has marked considerable amounts of improvement. Yes I may not be glowing and all that but I am hopeful… if I can discard any form of make up then there is hope for me yet. But then again it is that time of the year again – the gorgeous winters - which seems to have passed by in a week – and the heat shall begin and the sweating and the humidity and the skin getting all confused all over again.

I really think my skin has a life of its own. Like it thinks for itself. And it is mostly confused. Because I am from a hill station and because I have always lived in dry places, being in a city where every 5 minutes I feel like my t-zone is feeling oily and moist, I can only assume that my skin gets confused…on how to behave and how to look…so in that confusion it ends up with worry bumps, which we no-so-fondly call pimples. But it’s been quite some time, I am hoping like I am adjusting to this place my skin will too – and one day it will shine with health and joy like it used to… till then I will just go back to my dermatologist on peddar road and give him a thank you message. I can get out sans makeup. Yay…. I can let my real skin peep into the world. It’s a day to celebrate my friends!


“Mary had clear skin
The lambs loved her dimple
Aloe-vera and antibiotics
Pop goes the pimple.”