Ugly

Did I tell you about how I make a point to decorate my beauty school mannequin heads' faces? I've used ballpoint pen, acrylic paint, and nail polish so far. And one safety pin.

This takes the personalization and anti-theft process to the next level. Anyone else couldn't get far with one of my heads and get away with it.

Did I also mention that I am a face painter with respectable experience as well as an educated artist?

When I paint my own face and also when I have my heads around I forget the faces look different and am surprised when people notice. I'm pretty sure I don't do it for shock value but I could be wrong. I think I do art because I want people to see it and like it and I don't get to show my 2D art on a daily basis.

That pretty much sets the scene for today's little "event."

I happened to be working on one of my mannequins on the salon floor near my classmate and her client. I talked a little with both of them cheerfully and was excited about this new narrow curling iron I was trying.

Then I hear my classmate saying, "she actually does them herself."

I look up and the customer looks at me and says, "oh, I was just telling your friend I think your heads look kind of ugly."

I had 4 heads down there so she had an adequate sampling.

I look at her and say, "that's okay, most people don't understand my art and I'm okay with that." And as an afterthought, "the heads look pretty scary without paint too anyway."

With that, I start packing up to go to lunch.

I glimpse my stack of business cards looking up at me from behind some hair tool in my Mary Poppins bag of hairdressership and am struck with a blessed, blessed idea.

"Ma'am, here's my card. It has my website on it and you can go on it and see if you like any of my other art. I do makeup and photoshoots too so you might be interested in that."

That bitch.

Needs to work on her:

Tact

Word choice

Filter

I breeze on toward the lunch room and shoot my classmate a sly look.

It's true that very few people understand my art. And that makes me wonder if I actually make good stuff. But I like it. And I'm pretty sure people tend to not understand the better artists of their time.

Just saying.

Eyelashes

As of about two months ago, I have a newfound obsession with false eyelashes.

I had thought my short lashes were hopelessly unimprovable (screw the ads; mascara won't lengthen or volumize if there isn't anything there to begin with) and that God gave them to me for a reason, so that my face would be balanced in the way he wanted it to be (valid).

One day at the dollar store I saw false eyelashes, though, and decided to give them a try (not a sin). My face was transformed.

I had eyes.

I really started with the eyelashes when my teacher and I had a talk about my extreme makeup. I actually used face paint to do my makeup for school until she and a few other people in my life at the same time questioned my motives (pure) and suggested I pursue a more professional image. So now I use lashes as a way to maintain a bold look. 

And yes, I did find colorful eyelashes online. I can't just not push boundaries.

Of course, it took about ten minutes to fanegle the first pair on.

Therefore, I thought it would be a good idea to get eyelash extensions, which are advertised to stay on for about a month (this would eliminate morning application difficulties). Suffice it to say that I did not get the longevity benefits promised and caused skin and eye irritation when  bought my own remover and didn't read the instructions.

I went so far as to find extension glue and tell myself I could give myself extensions to fill it in. That flopped. 

My quest to have permanent long lashes is over. I now apply them daily and have reduced my speed and improved my accuracy.

Now I just wonder when I'll stop.

With the gel nails and extensions I've gotten in the past, the additions became the center of my attention, and a part of my identity. I became Danielle-with-gel-nails, for example. When I took them off, I was happy and free and realized that my appearance doesn't rely on something fake added to me.

But they were fun anyway.

I suppose now I'm at a point where I face the world as Danielle-with-lashes.

Strangely enough, I never felt that way with the face paint. It felt like a part of me and with or without it I still felt like myself.

So, whenever I stop with the lashes, be it in a couple of weeks, or when I have kids and can't deal with that kind of crap anymore, I imagine I will feel free and happy, and appreciate that God gave me minimal eyelashes so that the proportions of my face would be just right.

&

One is that some my school, students make posters to advertise upcoming events and clubs to be joined.  The girls who make these do a good job and convey color and enthusiasm in their work. There have been two recent notable incidents involving these posters.

One is that someone used the number 8 instead of an ampersand. I did a double take and saw that yes, indeed, whoever created this poster intended "8" to mean "and." I shudder to think that this young lady uses this ampersand shortcut in the rest of her writing.

I, for one, took pains to learn how to draw the beautiful ampersand and proudly use it every chance I get. I no longer have to use the plus sign when I am in a hurry and need to add a few words together.

I have pride issues.

However, the poster is beautiful. It is monochromatic (pink) and features many different fonts of different neat handwriting to advertise wearing pink on Fridays to support breast cancer awareness (wearers donate $3 to some cause or other).

I witnessed two staff members strolling through the school and discussing ways to make it more attractive to possible future students taking tours of the building.

Minding my own business, I heard one lady pointing out one such and saying, "now, these are ugly." As if that was the end of the matter and perhaps they should be taken down.

Ugly.

I talked to the other teacher later about that and she said she had to bite her tongue.

Good.

Students should be able to express themselves on the walls of the school.

I watched the movie "Gravity" with my friend the other night. It was a good choice because I had heard only negative and neutral criticism about it, so I knew I would not become emotionally invested in the movie and thus become emotionally exhausted. Also because of my indifference I expected I wouldn't experience much emotional reaction to anything that happened.

This is good because I avoid movies as they become a huge emotional investment for me.

My friend, on the other hand, had heard good things about the movie.

She became bored about a half an hour in.

I was pleasantly surprised at how much I liked the movie. And I did react emotionally to a lot of things that happened, and that was okay. At least I wasn't scared going in.

I like that our opinions met in the middle of the relatively extreme positives and negatives we had heard about.

I'm so happy I was able to finally form my own opinion after being negatively biased against it for several months.

A major theme in the movie is choosing life over death, even when death is the easiest way to go and nobody could be blamed for giving up. I liked that.