Hello! I’d like to introduce you to Leopold, my newly fugitive eyebrow hair. Leopold is the grumpy old man who lives on my face.
Leopold just moved in a couple weeks ago. One day I woke up and there he was, flaunting nonconformity like Bernie Sanders and his mittens. I have debated the Merits of Leopold ever since.
On the one hand, the bushy, unruly hair that collects in the ears and nose of men of a certain age has bed down on MY FACE. On the other hand, I’ve got a badge of “I don’t give a fuck” culture on my face. Hmm.
I decided to Google how to tame Leopold, just to canvass my options. And, not surprisingly but totally surprisingly (!), there is a whole universe out there of people who obsess over how to imprison their eyebrow hairs. For starters, there is eyebrow WAX (English wax, French wax, c.f. Clouseau, thanks). Wax that comes in a very small sardine tin and a brush that looks like a mascara wand bent at 90 degrees (it’s called a spoolie, I gather). There is gel. Soap. Hairspray. There is a whole taxonomy associated with this problem. I’m calling my fugitive “Leopold” but I believe the proper term is “flyaway.” There are women problem-solving for their eyebrow hair all over the internets. Some are in tears. They are all very earnest.
I decided to buy the wax (domestic), but have felt…uncomfortable using it. Debate about aging naturally (grey is good!) vs denying the inevitable dovetails with a separate debate I’ve had all my life—about makeup, spanx, padded bras, et al.—about, essentially, being who you are or faking it in public (what woman wasn’t traumatized by that scene in Animal House and I’m not even talking about the fact that the woman is entirely too drunk to be consenting to anything?). So, yeah, I rarely wear makeup, especially on days when the fake face seems entirely departed from the haggard, sleepy mess underneath. I worry, too, that conceding to makeup or to the wax-coated spoolie means I don’t like how I look, which is 100% true, but which I do not want to admit. I mean, is this really the road to self-esteem? Stuff it, paint it, wax it, and here I am?
I think it’s easy to take this position when you are young and kinda hot. It’s getting harder now that I have Leopold on my face. He’s so loud and crabby but, listen here, old man, I get where you’re coming from and I agree with a lot of your platform but you cannot get elected at this point, so cram it.
What will become of Leopold? I can’t say. But I imagine we’ll be staring each other down for a while, testing each other for moral supremacy.
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And now, for no episode of Name Your Shame because this week, I learned only about eyebrow hair and I think I’ve covered that ground amply.