I’m wearing red lipstick. From now on. It’s just something I do now.
And we are talking red, people. Crimson. Crushed holly berries. Blood on snow. It began New Year’s Eve. The Neos had a great show that night. To be festive — because I’ve tried to do the show in a dress and heels and it’s a disaster — I wore red lipstick. Later, at the after party, we posed for photos in a fancy photobooth. When I saw the ruby red lips in the pictures, I thought, “Yep.”
I’ve never been a lipstick girl because I have always regarded my mouth as horsey. If you don’t like your mouth, why draw attention to it? I preferred to draw attention to my eyes. And I learned a long time ago from a drag queen that if I accentuate my eyes and my lips, I look like a drag queen. Mortal women like me have to choose one or the other. Then I read in a fashion magazine that my theory was a good one, though drag queens weren’t mentioned. The magazine told me that “popping” the eyes and the lips would make the face look smaller. It’s awful how they tell you you have to look. Popping eyes and expanding faces and so on. But it affirmed my no lipstick, lots of mascara look and I’ve been working that one for years.
But I’m 30 now. It’s time to accept my mouth.
I am not going gently. There has been no gloss phase. No shell pink period. Red is the only option. I marched straight to the Yves Saint Laurent counter (if I was going to take lipstick seriously, it had to be the best) and tried on two shades. D.W. liked the second shade better. The lady wrapped it up in tissue and it felt deeply right.
I also now have a need for laundry stain treater. Red lipstick inspires; collars suffer.
Neat post! You talk about the aesthetics of lips/makeup. But it’s also kinda neat that your first post of the year is about the mouth, which is an instrument of talking. Like blog posting. Hehe. Kind of a weird connection. But still. It’s neat.
Oh my god. I feel the same way about my mouth. I like it, but it’s big, so I tend to mute it with nude glosses or browner, cinnamonier shades.
I’m doing punkplay right now and I’ve been intstructed to do the gothy smudgey eyes PLUS a BRIGHT RED LIP. I had the same reaction….um, you want me to emphasize both? So I did, and sooooo liberating to slap that red lipstick on and feel like Madonna in her early years.
I wtnead to spend a minute to thank you for this.
Hey, that’s the greteast! So with ll this brain power AWHFY?