The Luxury of Beauty

I come from a long line of women who take care of themselves. My great grandmother on my mother's side was a little firecracker of a flirt who wore red lipstick and pretty dresses, and although I never really knew my great grandmother on my fathers side he had a picture on his dresser where she looked like a Cameo in an elegant top knot and lace peter pan collar perfectly pressed in the soft black and white of the photo paper.

 My Grandmother on my mothers side who I affectionately call Gamu, is a a delightful platinum blond piece of work, with designer clothes and tan skin and a remarkably perky figure for a woman in her eighties. She has beautiful soft skin that has hardly aged at all, especially given the fact she has spent most of her life in the sun. She is beautiful...really, and when she was young she was all legs and tiny short shorts and a little bit of rock and roll. My Grandmother on my dads side who I call Granny, is in her nineties and still stunning. I never remember her elegant white hair ever being out of place. She told me once when I was ten, while I sat in front of her vanity on a little white wrought iron chair swinging my legs while she got ready, that a woman should always wear pretty underthings and made sure they matched. She had as a young woman an impossibly tiny waist and fantastic figure. Trying on one of her one of a kind tailor made dresses as a 14 year old, I discovered my waist to large and my body considerably lacking to fill out other areas. She must have been a real knock-out.

 My own mother is a beautiful woman and even in the woods of Montana where there would be no one for days and days. She always got herself fixed up first thing in the morning...a little makeup, hair done. I never have once, seen my mother in jeans. She always wore something just a little bit classy, a little bit nice. She always was active and healthy. I remember as a child some women being jealous of her. Intimidated by her graceful, thin, classic, beauty. But I was proud...still am proud.

 And so, I try to carry it on...I do love beautiful clothes, and shoes, and makeup...I spend considerable amount of energy trying to stay healthy and fit. I try to dress well, and appear put together. But the luxury of beauty is somehow escaping me these days.

 When my twins were first born I felt like my body was a bit of a train wreck...all night sweats and bloated, loose and out of shape. My skin was going crazy with all the shedding hormones and I didn't quite know what to do with the in between stage of regular clothes not fitting me, but the maternity clothes making me look like I was still pregnant. It didn't take that many times of brushing baby puke out of my hair that my long, thick hair got lopped off for a more practical, out of my way, bob. Putting on makeup in the morning became a circus act...shoot even getting dressed became a circus act and I found that these days I'm lucky if I get out of the door with my pants on the right direction. Twins and uninterrupted productivity is really not a common combination. Most days I'll glance down to find some greasy little hand print on my suit, or a mystery stain right on the front of my shirt. I'm always wrinkled, usually from carrying a baby on my hip, and there has been times when I look in the mirror at work to discover I only got one eye of makeup on before I rushed out the door. Blowouts don't wait. Clumsy top heavy toddlers don't wait to crash of the couch. "Sister stole my binki" squabbles don't wait for mommy to finish the other eye.

 My body has changed too. I trained and ran a marathon, a half marathon, and a obstacle endurance event since giving birth. I run and work out like potato chips, often pushing significantly heavy babies with me. Previously this would have afforded me the body I wanted. But still my body protests loosing those last five-ten pounds and stores them in the most frustrating places. Presumably terrified I will put it through the strain of 10 months of making people again. Whatever it is, it's ridiculous how hard it is to make my body what I want it to be since pregnancy.

 I try to make amends in the morning with the dark circles under my eyes when the girls are cutting teeth and fitfully sleep. I try to find the time to keep up with my hair. I try to make sure I at least smell nice and am clean. But I've had to let go of the luxury of beauty as I've known it. I still value it and hope to pass it on to my children, but it isn't what it was. And perhaps this is good. Perhaps it is truer beauty to find that what you do is more important then what you look like. Because I am a mother. That is what I do. And if I have stains on my shirt and oatmeal in my hair...if my clothes are wrinkled and my body defies me in some places its really ok. Because to my little girls I will be beautiful. Just as to me, my mother will always be beautiful.

 Sure I like to think in time I may be able to get back the stolen moments of luxury. Sometimes I try to create a moment of oasis...like the other night when I drew a hot bubble bath after the girls went down, lit some candles, plugged in the Ipod, and slipped deliciously slowly in, letting out a sigh of content...until something sharp and slimy dug into my spine. Fishing through the bubbles I pulled out a rubber duck with a rather sharp beak, an incredulous smirk frozen on his face...the moment was entirely gone, but I shook my head as I squeezed a liquid squeak out of it and laughed. I am a mother, this is my beauty.