Not long ago, I saw my own thigh in the sunlight though my bathroom window and I screamed. EW! Whose leg is that? I thought. I’m not kidding; that was my actual thought. I guess I expected to see my thigh as it exists in my memory. Not the world’s best thigh, but not a dry crepe-y one with no muscle tone. Today as I walked my dog, wearing cut off jeans because of the awful, muggy heat, I looked down and saw it again. Truly an old thigh, commensurate with my age but no less disappointing and even shocking.
You think this is stupid and shallow but just wait. You too will experience this cognitive dissonance unless you go blind, in which case you’ll have a while different set of problems. Since I rarely look at my own body in bright sunlight, I had no idea this was happening. A person I know who inspects every inch of her body and face every single day and exfoliates with a stiff vegetable brush will never be taken by surprise.
But keeping shit from falling apart is just too time consuming. It already takes me forever to get ready for bed, and my beauty routine is practically non-existent. Have you guys seem Kim Kardashian’s new skincare line with nine (or 12?) products that she says are essential to use together in a certain order? Forget the cost. The time spent at your sink would move bedtime to around 4:am. No, Kim, don’t make me!
So being an old bag leaves you very few choices of how to visualize and project your image to yourself and the world. On one end of the spectrum is Paulina Porizkova, who at 57 never stops bitching about how the male gaze won’t acknowledge her aging appeal while shoving her remarkably well-preserved body in our face nonstop on Instagram.
Paulina rose to fame at just 18 years old as the first Central European woman to be on the cover of the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue. Almost 40 years later, Paulina said she still feels sexy and hated society’s obsession with looking youthful. Despite still feeling confident though, the mother-of-two said younger men haven’t been interested in her.
daring to look her age!
Haha Paulina, you hate the obsession with looking youthful? I guess all the bikini shots are just something you do for fun.
She said: “I am now completely invisible.“I walk into a party, I try to flirt with guys and they will just walk away from me mid-sentence to pursue someone 20 years younger.”
God, just shut up Paulina and fuck off. Eat some sandwiches. If you want to hear more of this faux insecurity, check out her Instagram.
At the other end is Bridget Fonda, who has evidently rejected all efforts at looking young and attractive. When I first saw a recent picture of her, I didn’t believe it. It could not be her. Even though regular non-celebrities look old and fat when they’re old and fat, Bridget Fonda’s transformation is just startling. She is unrecognizable.
then and now
I felt sort of betrayed by Bridget. I should have admired her courage to stop pursuing a narrowly defined ideal of female beauty. Maybe she’s trying to live the opposite existence of her aunt Jane, whose face is now a clownish travesty
Somewhere in between these two extremes is a healthy outlook on aging. I just can’t find it.
It’s not the male gaze that bothers me. It’s my own gaze in the cruel morning light of my bathroom. I’m going to get some under eye filler and then go around pretending that I’d never get any filler, just like J. Lo and everyone else.
And I’ll stop wearing cut offs or just remember to not look down. Aging is so horrible! I just googled the insulting term “aging gracefully” and found a list of tips. I’m not going to follow any of them, because of my PDA, but you can if you want to.
Thoughts, ladies and gays?
My mom who is still a bombshell at 97.5 and I were shopping together at an Off 5th outlet in Florida (I know) when a women came in pushing her mom in a wheelchair. Her mothers hair was thinning, her clothing plain and she was not wearing any makeup. At the checkout we heard the daughter tell the salesperson that it was her mom’s 95th birthday. The salesperson wished her a happy birthday as did we as both the mom and daughter were clearly expecting some attention for this. My mother waited until we exited to say “She looks like shit”…….
I always thought that I had a good attitude about aging. Only because I didn’t think it applied to me. I never thought it would happen and in one month, I’ll be 60. Where did I go wrong?
I have an instagram account called @Kateoverfifty and came to the realization that I can be forever “over 50” so that makes me happy. The less I post, the more followers I seem to get. Maybe that’s my feminine mystique? Either way, I get a small thrill in thinking that I’m desired.
I’ve seen the Paulina account. Tiresome for me. Can’t stop staring at the two photos of Bridgett Fonda. How does that happen?
I have loved Paulina since the 80s (I’m 45) and I follow her on Instagram so I can feel hope about aging without surgical intervention. She is one of the few celebs who I actually believe hasn’t had surgery, fillers or botox. She has supermodel genes though and money to spend on the best skincare and personal trainers. I hope when I get to my 50s I can be brave enough to just AGE a la Patti Smith or Kim Gordon. I’m a chicken when it comes to surgical stuff though. I will do everything in my power to stay skinny and fit- Bridget looks like every woman from my home town and I have an inate repulsion towards that!
Thanks for the reminder about Bridget Fonda! What’s even more puzzling is she’s married to “Simpsons” composer Danny Elfman, who despite being almost 70 recently showed off his buff, tattooed torso in a shirtless session at Coachella. So while she’s abandoning vanity, he’s embracing it. What would Dr. Freud say?
This was the first email I read because I knew you would make me “laugh my ass off.”
Kate – YES, where did I go wrong is the question. I will go check out your Instagram!
Lindsay – Well, I can’t believe Paulina is natural but I agree on every other point. Bravo to Patti Smith but I just can’t follow her lead because I have no talent or gifts to make up for it, you know?
Sara – Right?? Are we being sexist though? Oh who cares. It is a mystery.
Rebecca Whitworth – Ha, thank you, so nice to hear!
Jane Bentley – HAHAHA! I think I would’ve reacted the same way! I am ruthlessly judgemental about people my age.
I think Bridget Fonda’s dress was the harbinger of her future self.
Jeez, I used to obsess over mascara…which ones match my eyelash color perfectly?, and the way jeans did or didn’t showcase my ass to my satisfaction, and pantyhose – pantyhose?? Do they still even make pantyhose? – and oh god, my hair color which I changed twice a month, and did I walk 5 or was it 7 miles yesterday, so can I eat a doughnut today? At one time I had at least 500 bottles of nail polish. I kept my makeup collection in a huge fishing-tacle box. All that wasn’t so terribly long ago.
I am so glad that’s mostly over with, so I can worry about the real shit, being now truly old and all. My mother made it to 83, sharp as a tack till she died, which she had the good sense to do just keeling over and getting it done quickly – boom. Her sister lived to 96 and looked great into her late 80’s – slim, wore makeup, minimal sag, got around great, the usual. But the last 7 years of her life she didn’t know where she was, who anybody was, and she couldn’t differentiate a toilet bowl from a linen closet. I’ll give you a dozen bouncy tits and an SUV full of aged but taut aerobics legs and a shitload of lapover-free bellies and perfectly smooth, flabless necks and inner thighs for one complete set of brain cells in tip-top working order. Yeah, I know, the brain’s just an organ of the body, so take care of the thighs and the frontal cortex will follow. Well, not always. So much luck involved, but the looking young thing was causing me way too much stress. Very, very bad for the brain, stress.
My goals for appearing in public, and I’d never suggest this for or demand it from any other human, are good hygiene, clean clothes, clean hair arranged attractively and easily (alligator clip or rubber band), and shoes that say sometime from the 21st century. If you continue to live (no guarantees there) you will get old, and depending on wildly complicated and complex factors and pure old luck, you might look it. Bring it on! I want that brain, fuck the makeup and upward-pointing tits.
Alison – Lol, I had not looked closely at that dress, but yep, it’s awful.
Bevitron – I think all that preoccupation with make up etc is an okay thing for the young, if it’s fun rather than stressful. I used to love doing my eye make up and nails when I was a teenager. Once it feels like a desperate defense against aging, it’s time to reevaluate. I agree, it would be nice to be an attractive 80 year old but being able to think is way better. Sadly for me, I couldn’t think of the word “succulent” yesterday while talking about gardens with two elderly neighbors who looked thrashed but could still retrieve words.
I’ve been having the “Whose body is that?!” response in the shower lately. Much of it is related to 4 months on dialysis and a kidney transplant, but most of it is aging. Fucking crepey skin! Fucking droopy things! Fucking sun-damage moles and freckles! I’ve been exfoliating my face every day because Tom Ford said he did that. I can finally work out again so I’m trying to salvage my ass, but fuck! And fucking gray hair! And fucking gray beard! Heading to dermatologist tomorrow because, get this, the anti-rejection drugs (I prefer to call them ‘acceptance drugs’) make me 80 times more likely to get skin cancer. At least my new kidney is only 39 years old. I bet it hates having to live with all those 54-year-old organs.
MARK-EE – fuck, what a nightmare. But wear sunblock and cover up xoxoxo
With aging comes the worsening of my eye sight. Which helps me not see my flabby bum or sun spots.
Oh Sister, I apologize profusely if it sounded like I was saying you, or anyone else, was wasting time playing with dumb makeup and stuff. Of course not! I LOVED it, too, that’s why I had my big-ass fishing-tackle box! I wish I still did love it but it used to make me look youthy and dewy and now there’s just a rouged corpse effect, and I’ll be there soon enough, no need to practice the look just yet. I’ve just given up what, for me, was turning into grisly desperation to hang on to my smooth, creamy yesteryear self, and not everybody feels like that.
Plus which, some people might be a hundred and still just love playing with all of it, like I love playing with my art supplies.
By the way, you’re beautiful and look 25 years younger, at least, and have a long, long way to go before the Rameses II stage. Stop inspecting your thighs and enjoy what you have. xoxo
Lorrie – Right?? Being short sighted has been a blessing.
Bevitron – No no, I got what you were saying and agree. Plus which, I love that you said “plus which”! I have a friend who likes to write “plussing as which” and it always makes me happy.
I don’t even think that’s Bridget Fonda. I have seen the photo before. I don’t like aging either, but my strategy is like everything that I don’t like and can’t change. Just try hard not to think about it. Though it’s unavoidable and shocking at times, I try not to dwell on it. But I never was a girly girl and didn’t wear makeup and always wore comfy clothes instead of sexy clothes. So,Mt hats me and I don’t think I’m going to change. I’m average average average. I embrace my average-ness.
Em – I think I’m too neurotic to embrace my average-ness. It sounds really good though! As for Bridgett, there are lots of photos now, not just that one, and in a couple of them you can totally see her former face submerged in there.
I turned 55 in May. I’ve always looked ridiculously young for my age ( I know,I know-poor me-insert eye roll) I knew I would just wake up one day and be a giant wrinkle. Because I have aged somewhat slowly there was not going to be a gradual ease into it I could get used to. And it’s happening-I’ve gone grey, my eyes, skin, and tummy are droopy, but the weirdest part is the starting to feel invisible. It’s not other people that make me feel this way-it’s my own reflection in the mirror-like where did I go?
My 5 yr old granddaughter told me I was beautiful today-but without my glasses on..haha ahhhh children. At least she still sees me.
Shelley Anders MacGibbon – You still look young for your age, and how wonderful that you have a granddaughter to love you!!! I have heard about the feeling of being invisible, but sadly for me, I feel all too visible, like people are thinking, what a tragic old bag, still wearing tight jeans and a t-shirt!
Now 71, old, invisible, except for the tattoos, which I forget I have till people remark about them. As my husband said a while back; “You’re sailing along and all of a sudden you notice parts start falling off and you realize you’re a shipwreck!”
Stephanie – LOL, at least you have a witty husband to see you through it!
Sister Wolf and Bevitron: Yay!! I loved the “plus which” too! What a great sound! And concept!
Look how many responses this post has gotten. I could chime in with everything I’m reading here, but I’m too busy laughing at your readers’ comments.
I couldn’t agree more with your “oh just fuck off Paulina” attitude. Like we’re all supposed to fucking congratulate her on her Sally Bowles artfully semi-photoshopped bullshit pose like that’s how she eats her Wheatabix every day. Brave? I thought Lena Dunham was brave for taking her clothes off on camera, or that Salman Rushdie was brave for going out in public. Paulina Porizkova is not brave, she’s just ballsy to suggest that we think of her that way.
By the way, you do have incredible hair.
Alison – So many good points! But just so you know, my hair is thinning and looks like shit. xo
Embrace the cutoffs! LA is hot and forgetting what your body looks like sounds like bad drugs. Good job, leg, for getting Sister Wolf where she needs to be.
Sands – Lol, still struggling though!
Trying to make sense of changing appearance at 50 and having a ten year old. She thinks I’m the bees knees but how is that going to change? Role modelling self love to a tween is getting to be impossible. Suggestions welcome.