Growing Old Disgracefully

I recently saw a cosmetics ad on TV that started off by saying something like: Worried about the signs of aging around your eyes? Sure, surgery may be one option, or you could try… There followed a spiel in which the qualities of the product in question to reduce the “signs of aging” were exulted. To which my immediate reaction was: Or, as a third option, you could develop some depth to your personality and not give a toss about such banal irrelevancies…

I mean, consider the “signs of aging”. Let’s be honest: when cosmetics ads talk about the “signs of aging”, they mean wrinkles. And wrinkles are supposed to be bad, because they’re a sign that you’re looking old. In other words, being old is bad - so the least you can do is not look old. And this is where all the creams and lotions and unguents come into the picture. All you have to do to stop looking old is layer your face in so much cosmetic you’re likely to be mistaken for a mobile sponge cake. Then you’ll be acceptable in polite society.

But I beg to differ. To begin, wrinkles don’t necessarily mean you’re getting old, only that you’ve lived. Sure, life can knock you out of shape every now and then, and maybe this does sometimes translate into a few extra frown lines. But doesn’t that same wear and tear also indicate a person rich in life-experience? Doesn’t it also indicate a person to whom others can relate, if only because of the fact of shared experience? You know what I think when I see allegedly “flawless” beauty? I think here’s a person who’s either been spoiled rotten their whole lives, or who doesn’t actually want to engage with life. And, yes, I appreciate that there are some people who are just naturally beautiful and don’t seem to “age” at all; but for the rest of us mere mortals, I think wrinkles are actually a pretty good indicator about the kind of life a person’s lead.

Secondly, I happen to think laughter lines around the eyes are an incredibly attractive feature. A woman with beautiful eyes will always get my attention, but if those eyes also show signs that the person possessing them has warmth and depth and a sense of humour, then beauty ceases being an impersonal fact and becomes human. Laughter lines are, for me, one means by which cold beauty ceases being remote, and becomes a pointer to the kind of personal characteristics I think make an individual worth getting to know.

Thirdly, what actually causes wrinkles – is it getting old, or is it all the stupid things we do to ourselves in the meantime? Granted, aging does make the skin harden, and that will normally produce wrinkles. But by what factor is this natural process exacerbated by all the unnatural things we do to ourselves? Take, for example, the Anglo obsession with getting a tan. We spend hours in the sun; we spray ourselves from head to foot with fake tan lotions; and we visit solariums and pay a fortune to be irradiated in coffin-shaped booths. Does anyone stop to think what this is doing to our skin, aside from turning us into the human equivalent of roast potatoes? I’m telling you now, our own vanity gives us more wrinkles than getting old ever will.

Finally, why on earth would you want surgery to remove wrinkles? You’d have to be either so utterly vain and self-absorbed as to be incapable of meaningful relationships with others, or so insecure that no amount of corrective procedure is going to make you feel good about yourself. You’re like the dude with the brand new car, obsessed with discovering the least scratch or imperfection. Even when nothing’s wrong, you’re likely to think there’s a nip to be made there, or a tuck to be performed here. And that way lies madness.

The bottom line is that we don’t like getting old, so we try and kid ourselves by various means that we’re really still young. But here’s a news flash, folks: we do get old, and there’s not a damned thing we can do about it. Nor is it a bad thing, either. Sure, no-one – Yours Truly included - wants age to be accompanied by either physical or mental infirmity; but do we have to subject ourselves to the unnecessary torture of living in a state of cosmetically induced denial? And, no, I’m not exactly thrilled about the fact that my hair is falling out, my eyesight dimming, and my waistline expanding – but it doesn’t matter how many face lifts, mud-packs, or Botox injections we undergo, the fact is we age.

All of us. And, one day, we die. Frankly, I want my corpse to look at least vaguely human, and not like some bizarre wax mummy.

So we’d all be better off just accepting the fact that we age, and learn not just to live with it, but appreciate it for what it is: part of our humanity. In the meantime, the billions we spend enriching cosmetics firms might be more usefully directed elsewhere: securing world peace, for example, or ending global poverty. Afterall, there’s plenty of people out there who’d just love to live long enough to have all the visible signs of aging.

Talk to you soon,

BB

Quote for the Day: No wise man ever wished to be younger. (Jonathan Swift)