Vanity Fair

I’m growing up in a home entirely devoid of any make-up kit. My mother–the only woman in the family–felt no need for any eyeliner, blush-on, lipstick, or anything of that sort. Rarely does she even wear any jewelry, save for the standard sparkly earrings on her lobes. She doesn’t even wear her wedding ring–not because of lack of devotion, but because she said the ring made her finger itch.

I never understood womanly vanity. It seemed weird to occupy oneself with her physical appearance. The female, however, is perpetually immersed in herself. “Born staring into herself in the mirror,” I’d silently quip. Women spend twice or thrice more time in the bathroom than men; generally, women take up more closet space than men (although the opposite is true in my family); and shopping sprees take longer when a lady is involved.

It just seems so weird to try to present yourself to the public as someone different from who you really are. In an effort to make a good impression on people, you put on too much of this and too little of that, ending up actually making yourself look bad. Your skin tone is borderline abnormal, your lips are so red it looks like the skin on your mouth is one-one hundredths of a millimeter thick. Your clothes are skimpier than what is decent, so much so that a troubled middle-aged man might mistake you for a hooker.

I think it’s unnecessary, in other words. Or do I?

My mother puts on a fancy dress only once every week: Thursday, church day. She’d put on a nice blouse and decent denim skirt, wear a bracelet, maybe a hair clip if she’s feeling extra vain. That’s it. On our weekend worship service, she wears a uniform for her duties in church. That is as vain as she gets. (If you don’t count the times when she’d look at Kris Aquino‘s face on a magazine and say, “I’m going to Vicki Belo for a face lift.”)

Whenever we’d go to the mall (usually on Sunday afternoons), she would wear these just-short-enough denim shorts and some t-shirt she had printed for an anniversary of the GSIS, the government agency for which she (and dad) works. Her hair would often be a mess, and she couldn’t care less. Vanity never appeals to her. She thinks of it as useless human nature.

I think the same thing, too. But why is it that when I go to the mall with her, I cannot settle for denim shorts and a plain white shirt? I always feel the need to put on my best denim pants and the latest statement shirt from Penshoppe. Often times, in the bathroom, I stick my face to the mirror to investigate my pimples and pockmarks up close. I have even daringly put on a tad bit of powder on my face before to cover up the remnants of my once-abundant zits. (I’m not gay, in case you’re getting prejudicial.)

Human nature is what I blame for my attitude, my hypocrisy. Somewhere in that primordial goo, someone must’ve dropped something that resulted in vanity spreading far and wide across the globe. After all, even ancient civilizations were vain. Discovery Channel documented this one tribe who put enormous plates on their women’s mouths, and ridiculously heavy earrings on their lobes. Men of another tribe hid their members with penis gourds, farcical contraptions worn around the belt and containing a tube in which the man’s wand was placed. Even the Egyptians buried their pharaohs in an adorned casket; vanity did not end with life, instead it was carried on after the person breathed his last.

I wonder how I’d react if my future wife (gulp) would unpack her make-up kit first after we’ve moved into our new home. It won’t be an easy task to get used to it, that’s for sure. Growing up in a home where vanity was deemed irrelevant, if not discouraged (by mom, at least), I’ll have to take some time to adjust myself to that new, vanity-friendly atmosphere.

In the meantime, I should stop scaring myself.