Wrinkles

Hi Steph,
A quick apology for not being regular with my posting. I've had the exciting but time-consuming pleasure of being with our parent and kid brother for the past month--yes, month--and haven't been on my game with posting. I want you to know, I wrote this post on my cell phone in the middle of Snow Canyon, Utah, which happens to the biggest naming fail in human history.

Exhibit A: The green in this picture does not adequately show the desolation that is Snow Canyon.

         The temperature was above 110 degrees, my enduring 1996 Honda Accord nearly overheated, but we got through. All of this was a week ago. This is just to show that I was thinking about you though my internet connection wasn't able to show it. 

         So I have dry skin and I live in the middle of what many people call a desert. It's a problem for my poor face, which is in a constant state of dearth, like a dry riverbed patterned with cracked segments of dirt. I've been around the moisturizer block once or twice but haven't quite found a product that quenches the thirst of my sad, decrepit skin.
         Thus, I've been on a journey to find a moisturizer that can sock a punch at desert dryness. I started my journey at my friendly neighborhood Walmart looking for ointments labeled "for extreme dryness" or "intense moisturizer" or other advertising mumbo jumbo. Instead I found the words "anti-wrinkle" and " age-defying" plastered on a hundred different products. At first, I was amused, but I quickly became frustrated as I searched bottle after bottle and ointment jar after ointment jar for a product focused on the health of my skin rather than on the looks of my skin. First of all, I'm 26 years old. I have no wrinkles, and I find it hard to believe that I'm the only young person, or older person for that matter, who has dry skin. Secondly--and more importantly--why are we so focused on looks? This ridiculous replacement of health for beauty surrounds us constantly. Advertisers sell whitening toothpaste louder than they do cavity-fighting toothpaste. We have lotion that tans our skin without the harmful rays of the sun, but it's still selling an arbitrary definition of beauty. (I own proudly my pasty white legs, thank you very much; however, I prefer the word "porcelain.")  Why are we anti-wrinkle? Why are old men called ruggedly handsome and old women called wrinkled and ugly? I know that all these anti-wrinkle creams have the moisturizing powers I need, but I didn't  buy any of them because I refuse to support the idea that this (see below) is ugly. 

         My body is not an item to be minutely criticized from earlobe to thigh gap to pedicured toe. It's not perfect by media standards, but I try to keep it healthy including emotionally loving it with my thoughts and words--and I'm sick of finding reasons to fix another part of it everywhere I look. 

         So to the anti-wrinkle cream producers out there, I see your lie. I know you are just creating a need for me to spend money on to fix it. But when I look at myself in the mirror I see nothing broken there. I'm housed in a working body granted me in the miracle of birth. It's beautiful, future wrinkles and all.

wrinkles: a physical showing of experiences, joys, sorrows, and a life lived

Cheers,

Amanda Kae

P.S. By the way, when I finally found a good moisturizer, it was the only cream not housed in a fancy, romantic looking, silver lined bottle. 

This stuff definitely isn't selling looks, but it works awesome!

Got any suggestions on how we can fight back against this focus on looks? I'd love to get your input.