Lisa's Pre-New-Year's-Resolution Guide to Looking Skinny Even When You're Not

1.  Stand very tall.  Think skinny and long, and in the Mind Over Matter philosophy, you will be thin and tall. Mind over matter. If you believe it hard enough, it just may happen.  (No, really!)   Picture the top of your head moving upward to the sky, pulling and thinning the body beneath it, like a little round piece of chewing gum being stretched.  Or like taffy.  Or a tootsie roll.  Or a strand of spaghetti pulled off a plate -- No, forget the spaghetti; that's just weird.  Go back to taffy.

2.  Think Vertical. As per #1, vertical means "skinny."  You've never seen a fat-looking zebra, have you?  Well, then.  Wear vertical stripes somewhere on every outfit.  Drape long winter scarves over your shoulders.   Wear gaudy sweaters over white shirts, but leave the sweater unbuttoned so it will look like you're only as wide as the white shirt that shows in the middle.
  
Conversely, never, ever, ever wear round-about stripes!  Don't even let your children wrap their arms around you in public.

3. On the other hand, do use your children and husband as props. One child in front of each hip does wonders to hide the chocolate coffee creamer you've been drinking all Advent. And tucking half yourself behind your husband makes it look like you're one of those schmaltzy, cozy couples; nobody needs to know that you're using your honey for camouflage.

Illustration: If she had just pulled her son around to the other hip, this woman could have lost another twenty to thirty pounds visually.

4. If you can't hide, however, Distract.  Wear jingle bell earrings -- or snowmen, or candy canes, or six-inch long sparkly earrings -- anything to draw attention from your midsection and up to your ear lobes.  Everyone has skinny earlobes.

5.  Give off the illusion that you are completely comfortable with your weight.  A confident, happy woman with a healthy self-image overcomes any weight issues.  Make it seem as if dieting is the last thing on your mind; you have more important things to take care of, certainly, and the world should not think that vanity is more important to you than happiness, right?  Be the jolly party-goer!  Chocolate Fudge?  Why not?  Hot Buttered Rum?  Go for it! The New Year will be here before we know it.  Then everyone can be miserable, dieting together.  But, it's the Christmas season now!  Hide those pounds behind your Christmas Spirit!

* I toast my fellow plump revelers with eggnog in my coffee this morning!  Cheers!  Today we justify, tomorrow we die-t.

Theresa and I got to go on our girls' day out on Wednesday.  We got in some school shopping and some thrifting -- a favorite hobby of mine. This Mama's gotten so many play-days off lately going out with each of the kids that one might think she was taking advantage of having ten children to goof off or something...  It's just one of the perks.  One I recommend all Big Family Moms take advanatage of!

So, anyway, it was Theresa's turn for a day out, and she had a short list for shopping, but we also popped into a walk-in salon and had our hair styled, the two of us.  Theresa's hair is very thick and wavy and hard for an eleven-year-old to take care of, so we wanted to thin it out a bit and add some shape.  We love how it turned out:

My hair had reached perennial-pony-tail stage and I just needed a change, so I had it layered and shortened.  This is my new grandma-to-be do:

Without the weight to hold 'em down, the curls have escaped and are having a party.  I'm not sure how I like it, but my husband gave it the thumbs up so I guess it's ok.  (He's taken to remarking when a curl fluff goes completely off the reservation -- which is lovely, actually, because I never thought  before that he noticed that I had hair...)

But, I digress...  After our shopping and salon time, Theresa and I had planned to go on a hike, but, of course some afternoon thunder showers rolled in, so we made the drive to town to see The Sorcerer's Apprentice, instead.  You might remember I took Dominic to see it on his day out a couple weeks ago,  and when Michelle's turn came she had to see it, so, of course when Theresa's day came, she had to see it, too... So, I've seen this movie three times now within two and a half weeks.   

The sorcer, the apprentice and I are getting sick of the sight of each other. 

And I stll have four kids to go.

 But it is a rare, relatively clean movie: only one definitely distinguishable Lord's name in vain and only one character in the end with objectionable attire (and we didn't have to see much of her).  The story line is an action-packed old-fashioned tale of good versus evil where the good are obviously good and work hard and honorably to eventually defeat the obviously evil bad guys.  And they did an admirable job of working in the iconic scene from Fantasia.  Truly, I don't really mind trotting the children out one by one to see this movie.  But, heavens above!  Hand me my hair clippers! Maybe Nicolas Cage's long messy locks were just being in character, but I have to tell you, if I were a sorceress, I'd wave my wand -- or magic ring -- and whisk a comb and clippers through his hair. Forget the brooms and mops!
On that subject (and no,  there couldn't  possibly be a more trivial subject matter, I agree...), I present to you:  

 Nicolas (no "h")
Through The Years
(Or Hair Today, Gone Tomorrow; Back Again)

(1)

Young Nick. There's the forehead, big sideburns, goatee
(So young and green here he's not even in focus yet)

(2)

Nick with lotsa hair!
(Speculative scowl)

(3)

Practically hairless, all forehead
(Meditative, suave -- scowl ready to use in his shirt pocket)

(4)

Nick a little older:  lots of forehead, no sideburns, long fringe in back
(Thoughtful scowl)

(5)

Nick sporting cool shades under big forehead, no sideburns,  short fluff
(Bewildered scowl)

(6)

NIck with more fluff, but still not touching collar,
sprouting distinguished grey facial hair
(Either chipper or snide scowl here, I can't decide)

The newest Nick look from Sorcerer's Apprentice
(The old man version of shot #2, getting ready to scowl)

So, what do you think?

 I like hair #2, but it wouldn't be bad with a version of facial hair #6/7...

And, not that it matters, but...  I guess I like Nick, especially in movies I can go see with my children, like Sorcerer. He has nice eyes and bold screen presence.  And he's dependable.  He's one of those actors you can always depend upon to play himself, always the same (somewhat flat) inflection accompanying some variation of the Nicolas scowl -- but with different wardrobe and ever-changing hair.  He's no Dan, but for a movie actor, he's passable.

So...

I'd like to talk about grey hair.  It's been on my mind (or at least that general vicinity) lately. 

In fact, being solidly over the middle-age hump now, I have a lot of questions about the general effects of aging... like:

* How is it I seem to have a deeper "consternation" wrinkle between my eyebrows than I have a "shock and surprise" wrinkle across my forehead?  I've been thinking about it and I'm not sure that my sense of bewilderment has been that completely eclipsed by agitation.

* What's with the eyesight thing?  It's gotten to be a real problem not being able to see either road signs or a book right in front of my face.  I was just getting used to blurry distances when the age fairy stole my close-up vision, too.  What's with that?  Wouldn't it be so much nicer if the near-sightedness and the far-sightedness could just shake hands and meet in the middle -- and I could have 20/20 vision now instead of bifocals?

* Why are dimples cute on babies' knees and elbows but not on mine?

But, as I started saying...  The chief focus of my discontent right at the moment is really the grey hair problem.  On any given night, you can find one or another of my smaller children perched  behind me on the back of the living room couch picking at my head like a little baboon, seeking out and removing grey hairs.  (Or I should say "white" hairs, because mine come in sparkling, neon white. Or titaniam silver. Unmissable.)  A different child can take his or her turn every night of the week and the silver mining stays just as productive.  Silver hairs for everyone.  Woe is me.  It's become a worry that there will soon be too many to pluck out.  And I wouldn't rather be bald.  But, I just colored my hair a month ago and the blasted things are cropping up like weeds  again, already...  What's a woman to do?  How does this happen?

* How is it that a whole hair will sometimes go grey overnight?  How is it they don't start at the bottom and inch their way up like my dark roots?  Why are the children not plucking out half-dark, half-grey hairs?

* Why are most of my grey hairs right on my part where everyone can see them? How come they can't hide in that thick place in the middle of the back of my head?

* Will my eyebrows go grey, too?  And, if so, when?  And what do I do about that?  Just color over them with my eyebrow pencil or smudge some hair color on 'em when I'm touching up the grey on my head?

* Why is it that stress causes more grey hairs, but vacation doesn't take them away?

* Is it more graceful to allow myself to go completely grey gradually, or should I wait until my 65th birthday and just. suddenly dye my hair snow white? 

--- Maybe I'll get a mohawk, too.  Kevin would be jealous.

Heads Up, Young Mothers...

Sunday morning, and a little time before I have to head out for 10:00 Mass. The roast is already on, the little boys are playing nicely with their little barn and farm animals. My wh is already at first Mass with part of the bunch ... (Splitting Masses is a whole other post topic!)

So, I was just getting dressed this morning and "fixing my face" for Mass, and made a somewhat disconcerting discovery, that I need to share with y'all really quick here.

You know that face you make? That "Don't-you-even-think-of-it!" face you make at the children? The one you use when you don't want to/have to say a word? Well, look out! I've got this crease right between my eyes now -- and I'm afraid it's a permanent crease! And I'm sure it's from making that face for twenty-odd years now. Gee whiz!

I need that face! But seriously, if I want to minimize further wrinkle damage, I'm going to have to do something! Maybe I should have two or three alternate expressions to use to keep from pressing indentations and creases in the same places all the time. I'm going to have to work on this....

(I mean, it's not vanity, really.... I'd just like for most of my wrinkles to be smile wrinkles! )

Vanity of Vanities, All is Vanity

So maybe it's a function of my age, but it seems that the wild extremes of early motherhood ~ between being carefully dressed and coiffed for rare outings and spending the balance of most days in my pajamas ~ has leveled out to a somewhat bohemian middleground. I'm only a little disappointed that I never could quite make the June Cleaver grade. But I'm happy that the days of feeling lucky to get a shower between diaper changes and nursing babies have passed and my robe is usually hanging on the back of the bathroom door by 8 am now. I'm glad to be at the point where I can comfortably dress just outside the fringes of fashionability. (Denim skirts, tees and dangly earrings are timeless, aren't they?) I've come to peace with the wild rollercoaster trainwreck that I call bangs and have given up trying to smooth them down into anything resembling the hair-do d'jour. There is a certain privilege to age (Ahem! Maturity!) which releases us from a lot of the youthful pressures of fad and fashion. Suitability becomes more important than conformity. It's good.


Nevertheless, every year at this time, I can't help but feel the same twinges of angst. If you know me or have been paying obsessive attention to my posts (Why would you do that?), you may have caught on that my birthday is coming up, and I can honestly say that is a prospect that neither fills me with particular expectation nor dread. I don't require more than a handmade card or a phone call from my loved ones and a few hours alone with my wh to make me perfectly content. The very idea of planning an occasion of my birthday gives me a rash. And, though those twinges may make you think otherwise, the passing of the years alone does not make me sad in the least. Stretching before me I see the golden days when I can dandle my grandchildren on my knee and hand them back to their parents when they're poopy. I love watching my children grow to be men and women before my eyes; it's like reading several novels at once, except I have a hand in the outcome. No, it's not the fact of aging that bothers me. It's the effects of it.


Like when I look in the mirror.


I admit it. I don't want to look old! My little girls tell me there are too many grey hairs to pull out these days; they're coming in patches now, it seems. It gets harder and harder to lose weight. Harder and harder to get up off the floor. The bags under my eyes can justifiably be called luggage now and anything that can sag is sagging. OK, so it bothers me! Is it vanity, I ask you, though, or is it self respect?


I want to recognize the girl looking out at me from the mirror. I would like her to look like the older sister of the one I fondly remember, not like her grandmother. At least not yet. I want to be attractive for my husband; that's an important consideration. We do compete, in a way, with the women in the world that our husbands meet in their daily wanderings. I don't want to come up lacking. And if I must, due to sheer mortal accountability to time, look and feel less like the energetic young mother that started this career twenty years ago, I hope I can at least replace some of the energy with wisdom and some of the youthful sparkle with radiant distinction. I can age with grace and dignity and keep a youthful perspective. I have the advantage of a positive outlook. I have healthy self respect.


And I have an appointment on Tuesday to have my hair colored. Red.