Stella prefers to smell like herself, thank you.

Facebook makes me feel like a stalker. I say that because I suddenly have all of this information about what is happening in my friends' lives, even friends who are not-particularly-close friends, and while I hate myself for it, I can't help checking back and back and back again to see their status updates. In the single year since I've been on Facebook, I have learned more about some of my acquaintances than I was able to in a solid decade of speaking with them face to face. I have come to sense their moods and rhythms. I know what they're eating, when they're feeling sick, what movies and songs are on their minds. The people who name such things are calling this "ambient awareness" and it is a phenomenon that is so uniquely modern that it scares me.

I am not sure that I need to know all this stuff about these people. I am fairly certain I don't want to. Some of it is heartbreaking - a friend, whom I wasn't really close to in high school, but who I liked and admired very much, is flying Blackhawks in Iraq. I hadn't thought seriously of him in fifteen years, since he attended my graduation. Now I think of him in that fucking sandbox every single day, as I look at the pictures of his gorgeous fiancee and read his tender comments. Some of it is too much responsibility - I have access to info about my nieces that I'm fairly certain their moms are better off in the dark about. Some of it is baffling - inside jokes between my friends and their college or high school or summer camp BFFs, broadcast for the world to see, but not understand. Some of it is just plain irritating - political ugliness abounded recently, and some update TOO FREQUENTLY (you know who you are.)

The thing is, though, that I can't stop myself. All these people I didn't really get along with all those years ago? We are more alike than I ever dreamed. All these people I thought I was kindred spirits with? Turns out they have abominable taste in movies, or listen to the sort of Top 40 dreck that turns my stomach. And my real friends, my good friends? Facebook is just one more way to interrupt their work and force them to send me pictures of Jonathon Rhys Meyers dressed as David Bowie. I am addicted to knowing that I am connected, to knowing that people are following my story as I follow theirs. I really write this blog for myself - well, and La Fab - and I am never sure who is reading along and smiling or crying or caring. Facebook, though... I can rest assured that no matter how silly or obscure or profound my update is, someone will see it and get it, or ask about it. Someone out there gives a shit. Kind of. In an incurious, time-killing sort of way. I'll take what I can get.

For those of you who missed my Facebook update this a.m. (or who, heaven forfend, don't Facebook), I posted it as the title of this post. It's because I broke my bottle of Dolce and Gabbana Light Blue on the tile floor in my hotel bathroom in New Orleans, and for a few days, before I could replace it, I used some other scents. This morning, when I opened my shirt drawer, the sweater I wore the other night was on top of everything else, and it smelled of some other woman's perfume. So did everything else in there. I reacted like I would if it were on a lover's coat rather than my own sweater: I reared back and wrinkled my nose in distaste. I dug something to wear from the very bottom, where it was least tainted, and shook it out before putting it on. Then I sprayed my hair with D&G Light Blue, just to maintain equilibrium.

I am obsessed with this song right now, so you have to listen, too:

I like the reds.

Hi there, gentlemen! Are you here for salient political observations? Bittersweet childhood musings? Dry wit? You might want to peruse the links bar over there to your right, because this post is all about lipstick. You're more than welcome to stick around, of course, but I think my rather desultory wanderings today will have a significantly narrower focus - and appeal - than usual.

Obligatory disclaimer out of the way, I'll get down to business. The last time I was in Seattle I lost my favorite tube of lipstick. It was the next to last day of our trip, and God forbid I should try to go a single day without that silly tube of color. I frogmarched my poor protesting offspring to Nordstrom's, straight to the MAC counter, and requested my precious Ladybug. The woman working that morning (I always get the same lavender-eyeshadowed young 'un there, so unlike the delicious gay boy who helped me at Macy's in Midtown) asked if she could get me anything else. Yes, I said. Powder foundation, please, and another tube of lipstick: Russian Red. Oh, says she. You like the reds!

Yes. I do.
I wish I was the sort of lady who contented herself with a nice neutral toffee color, or even a peachy glaze that makes my mouth look like candy. No such luck, though. I prefer the eye-catching blaze of vermillion hues. I get a lot of askance glances here in this town, where brushing your hair before going out to dinner at a $35/plate Mediterranean restaurant is considered getting dressed up. I am pretty sure there are a few people who think I peddle more than coffee and rock and roll. Fuck them. They're just jealous.

For your viewing pleasure, close ups of my collection in situ. Ladybug
MAC
Russian Red
MAC

Viva Glam I
MAC

Grenadine
L'orealWine and Roses
MaybellineVintage Wine
Physician's FormulaNoir Red
Besame CosmeticsPlump My Pucker in Spike My Punch
The Balm

There was northern light from the window I was sitting next to when these pictures were taken, so the colors are not true. But you get the idea, right? The Balm lipgloss is the one I wear most, since it's work-appropriate. I have two tubes of it, one of my purse, the other for my pocket. Ladybug is my go-to for day to day; I've been sporting the true matte red of Russian Red a couple times a week. Viva Glam I is my favorite dingy bar lipstick, and I almost always wear this one on stage. The exception was our recent trip to Haines and Juneau. I had misplaced it, and so relied entirely on Ladybug for the whole trip. Grenadine was my favorite for a long time - it's pinker than it seems here. The Wine and Roses was an attempt to break out of my true red addiction; it's quite corally. Unfortunately, it is also smeary, too thick feeling, and it smells just like watermelon Bubble Yum, which I despise. If I can smell my lipstick over my perfume, it's a problem for me. It's too bad, because the color is flattering. They don't make the Physician's Formula Vintage Wine glaze anymore. I love the blood red color, but not the strangely gritty texture. And the Besame Noir makes me feel incredible and sexy, but I haven't had a chance to wear it out of the house yet. New Orleans may be its world premiere.

I was going to show off my Monday outfit, but it's actually quite boring. The skirt I am wearing is a little too big (!) and the sweater I am wearing now seems too short proportionally. Oh, well. At least I am wearing knee socks and heels.

Okay, boys, you can come back in now! I promise next time I'll talk about something less gender-specific. Although that's pretty biased of me, isn't it? There really shouldn't be a reason make-up is gendered, except our own ridiculous societal expectations. Next time I'll try to bow less to the constructs of our culture, how's that?

A Lady of Distinction

While I was on my trip to visit family over the holidays - the reason for my conspicuous absence, if there was anyone who didn't know - I had the very good fortune to see my Grandmama again. I had thought that I would never see her again, and this will almost certainly have been the last time, and I wish with all my heart that it had been different.

My Grandmama (that's Grand-ma-MA, not GRAND-ma-ma) is not really my grandmother. She is my sisters' paternal grandmother, from my mother's first marriage. But she has always been a big part of my life, from the time I was born. She was one of those adults who never really learned to deal with children, so inadvertantly paid them the great compliment of treating them exactly like anyone else; that is to say, like adults. She never condescended or talked down; if anything, she would talk over your head and act rather impatient if you didn't understand her. She was intimidatingly small. I'm sure you know the type of person - their lack of stature invites a proportionally imperious character. She was fond of travel, delicious things, particularly if they were white, and good skin. The last time I saw her, in fact, she imparted three bits of wisdom to me, as at the age of twelve I was, in her eyes, on the brink of womanhood. The pieces of advice were as follows:

1) No matter how imploring the interviewer, a lady never reveals her age.

2) No matter how inviting, a lady never succumbs to the rather plebian habit of exposing her skin to the sun. This means very large hats and glasses, and in later years, the sort of sunblock that is reserved for those kids with ultraviolet allergies.

3) No matter how tired or uncaring she may be, a lady never, and I mean never, under any circumstances, appears in public in deshabille. This means less than perfectly coiffed, less than perfectly dressed, less than perfectly made up. And my Grandmama was always an arbiter of style. Photos of her from her youth, and her waning youth, and even her middle age show a woman with good taste and restraint. Her trademarks were her impeccable skin, her tiny (23"!) waist, and her waist-length jet-black hair. Nearly as well known was her biting wit.

This last was sharp was a knife at times. The edge of her tongue could scar you for life if you weren't careful. Luckily, I was never the object of her well-known put-downs, but I heard about them, and heard them in person plenty. Once, in my defense, she said to her own son, "Stop being such a pig to that child, Joey. She is only a girl - something you might understand." He turned beet red and said not a single word to me for the rest of the evening. I thought for sure she was an angel. I adored her for the way she seemed to look down her nose a the people she needed to tilt her head to see, I admired her coronet of raven braids, and I marvelled at her sheer loveliness. My mother was pretty, in a careless, farm-fresh way, but I never saw elegance until I spent time with my Grandmama.

It was lowering, then, to see her in the nursing home. She has Alzheimer's, and it has taken so much more than her memory. Her hair is gone now, cut into a fluffy white bob that is easily cared for, I'm sure, and pink at the roots where an aide "prettied her up" with an auburn rinse. She was wearing polyester, and not the expensive faux-silk she would have chosen thirty years ago for an intimate dinner at home with her grandchildren, but double knit pants and an undistinguished shirt that hung on her too-thin frame. It was the very first time, after three decades on this earth, that I have ever seen her without a smidgen of makeup - never mind full powder and eyebrow pencil, the woman didn't sport so much as a swipe of lipstick. The only thing that was unchanged about her was her skin. It was finely lined, since she is very, very old, but it was still soft-looking, even, and white. The older people I have touched often have skin that feels like fine paper, like tissue. The skin on her hands felt like she was wearing gloves of some sort - kid suede, perhaps, or heavy silk twill. And her cheek was the same: impossibly soft.

I thought there would not be much of her left when I spoke to her. I thought she would not even have an inkling of who I might be. But when my sister brought me to her attention, she said, "Why, child, you've grown!" And I knew that some deep spark fired in her brain, and I was there, even if it was only for a moment. Something inside me broke, because until then I could pretend that this was some other woman, an imposter masquerading as my Grandmama while the real one laughed herself silly on a Brazilian beach somewhere, busying herself with the cabana boys. But no, I was there in her mind, and she really was the woman who loomed so mythologically large in my own mind, made small by the ravages of time.

Before we left, she asked my sister, as she apparently always does, how old she is. My sister replied in all honesty, breaking one of my grandmother's cardinal rules. The number she named is impossibly high. Grandmama thought so, too. "Dear God!" she exclaimed with a look of horror on her white face. My own mother, in a moment of tenderness, replied, "No, Monique. She's confused. You are fifty, but no one knows that except me. Everyone here thinks you are a very well-kept thirty five."


I did not know her when she was fifty. She was already heading into her sunset years, to borrow a terrible euphemism, when I came along. I wish I had, though. I wish that there were another fifteen or eighteen or thirty years I could spend taking the bits of wisdom she offered me and slipping them carefully away like the rhinestone ring she once gave me, right off her finger. I wish that I could say that I believed I would see her again, even in the state she's in. But I can't - this was the last time I will ever see her, I am sure. She isn't really here anymore, and her body is going to figure that out sooner or later. I just hope that there is a decent shoe repair place where she's going, and a pharmacy that sells Pond's cold cream and Coty Airspun powder in Alabaster, because she'll be out to make an impression.