"You can always tell a woman's age by her neck and her hands."
This is the first cautionary beauty tale I remember my mother sharing. I must have been a pre-teen. Oddly, her fearmongering mentioned nothing of wearing daily SPF or wide-brimmed hats -- of course not, this was 1990s Mississippi -- but was relegated solely to lotions, oils and cold creams. Such potions were meant to be applied often and in abundance; I must have been the only 15-year-old in America slathering herself in Neutrogena body oil after every shower.
The author and her mother on her wedding day. Love and Wolves
As a Southern woman born in the late 1950s, as well as the granddaughter of Lebanese immigrants (who took their skin care regimens as seriously as their rolled grape leaves), my mother always equated beauty with access.
She was a brunette, olive-skinned woman coming of age in a world of Christie Brinkley beauties. Mahogany-haired bombshells like Sophia Loren, Isabella Rossellini and Mississippi's own Miss America, Mary Ann Mobley, became my mother's beauty idols. She believed Joe Cocker's "You Are So Beautiful" was the most romantic song in the world. She never left the house without wearing lipstick. The pursuit of beauty was my mother's Roman Empire. Ironically, though, it was rarely her priority.
The author's mother in college. Deenie Hartzog-Mislock
Anyone who knew her would agree that my mother was gorgeous. Naturally effervescent, with electric coffee-colored eyes, a wide white smile and, of course, skin as smooth as suede. But once she had children, and eventually a slew of grandchildren, my mother never spent money on herself. While she still took great effort in crafting her appearance, when it came to indulgences, she instead splurged on presents and plane tickets to visit my brother and I, who'd moved far away from Mississippi.
My mother's obsession with beauty rubbed off on me like chalk to jeans. My Lebanese aunts, with their coiffed hairstyles, gauzy kaftans and chiming gold bracelets had pushed their creams and oils on me as long as I could remember. Even as an awkward middle schooler, when I looked much more like Augustus Gloop than the Hollywood icons my mother adored, they fawned over my "natural beauty." Sharing their skin care routines was a way of showing love. It was my family's portal to power, confidence, and acceptance. Beauty was our holy trinity.
As we both grew older, my mother admired beauty techniques from afar and I became a freelance beauty writer. I went to work at Vogue, where there was a certain expectation about one's appearance. I became the beauty gift-giver, the one always "in the know." The most effective cleansing brushes, lymphatic drainage devices and neck-firming creams. Premium hair care, the best boar-bristle brushes and microfiber hair towels. Even today, I am my family's beauty czar, which is a role I have relished.
Then, at the start of 2024, my mother abruptly died of a cardiac arrhythmia at just 71. I was six weeks postpartum with my second child and struggling to wear a smile for my three-year-old. I threw myself into work, my writing and, of all things, a daily beauty regimen. I could not afford to disappear from my children, my means of income, my health and my responsibilities. So I chose an obsession I was rather familiar with.
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