Iske Conradie does not care. She
has not been on a diet in eight years. She has never followed the advice of a
Youtube makeup tutorial. She rarely does her nails. Sometime she even air-dries her
hair and uses normal soap for her face. Iske decided to spend a day being fanatical
about her appearance, just to experience having every care in the world.
Eight years ago I wilfully decided never to let socks or thigh
measurements dictate my mind ever again.
I despise worrying about my appearance and I have one reason not to
thank for it - the death of my father.
I had just recently returned to school after he had passed away. One day
I walked past a few high school girls contemplating how high they should pull
up their school sock, to appear cool.
In that moment I could recall how I had also worried about my socks
before; I had also believed socks could affect the course of my life. Now that
I was familiar with an event that really distorted life, the thought of
fretting such trivial things made me nauseous.
Society is delusional
I was disgusted that I had wasted so much worry on diets, beauty tips,
fashion, trying to improve myself and envying others. I thought of nearly every
girl in school, me included, that had tried throwing up after meals just to
lose weight. The destructive anxieties that ruled our minds were petty and so irrelevant
to being happy.
Ever since that day I decided to trust that I was perfect regardless of
the image society set as cool or attractive; society was clearly delusional.
Eight years have past since then and I've met very few people that feel
the same callousness to "must-have" beauty products and
"must-do" diets as I do.
I can barely recall the terror of failing a 10-day diet plan and I don't
know what I should and shouldn't be wearing to look skinnier.
So today I'm going to immerse myself in the minds of the majority - who
don't think like I do. For one day I'm aiming for "hair with volume",
unnatural "natural makeup", "glowing skin" and the "I
need to lose weight"-mantra.
Morning ugly
I wake-up at 5:00am hideous; I'm lacking all of the above.
Shower-time. I use a face wash. Rinse. Facial scrub. Rinse. Body wash. Rinse.
Body scrub. Rinse. Rinse again to get those pesky little body scrub granules
off. Shave cream. Shave. Rinse. I wash my hair. Rinse. I condition my hair and
wait three minutes before I rinse for the final rinse.
Thirty-five minutes later and I've finished half the town's water
supply. At least I'm eight times fresher than my fellow citizens.
I youtube some advice from self-proclaimed
hair and make-up experts.
Vlogger, Kirsten Mee, tells me how to Blow-Dry Hair Straight (with Volume!).
I part my hair in three. I part the three parts in two more parts. I
clip all these parts to my head. Then I untie them one by one to comb and blow-dry
every piece individually with my hair dryer.
I torch each section's roots to frighten them. That'll make them stand
up for some "gorgeous volume".
Next step is straightening all these sections with a straightening iron.
Twenty-five minutes later and I think I just ironed out my (with Volume!).
RhaeaEstelle's Youtube video illustrates how I should
apply my second face. I prep my real face with moisturiser. I dab two fingers in
liquid foundation and slap it all over my tarnished skin. In a downward motion
I spread the foundation evenly. She makes me paint my nose with a brush.
Youtube-channel MakeupByAlli
shows me how to make one eye pretty in eight minutes. It takes sixteen minutes to draw
around my eyes.
My diet breakfast is hot water with
a spoon of lemon juice (a great way to get your metabolism working), two baked
apples and a spoon of muesli.
I
can't drink water from the tap, because it washes off my second face.
By the time I put on a cute dress, kitten heels and understated
jewellery more than an eighth of my day is spent.
A walking doll
I put my earphones in and tip tap to class in my heels. Along the way I
have to stop myself from playing air drums or miming the words to my favourite
songs - I'm suppose to care what people think now. I hate this.
The girls I pass, with plastered faces just like me, smile at me charmingly.
The ones who dress like I usually do
don't even look at me.
I never looked plastic girls in the eyes either. I always wanted them to
notice me not caring what they look like. As a doll-face for the day, I feel
affronted. They're so rude. I'm so rude.
When I pass men on the street I can't help avoid looking at them. I don't
want to see them judge me for looking like I'm begging for male attention.
My hair sticks to my lip-gloss.
I'm just in time for my class. My feet ache.
Striking a pose
A
classmate, Annzra Naidoo, walks up the hall just as I enter my class building.
"Your shoes, your ..." gesturing towards my jacket, "I just love
your whole outfit, it's so cute!" she exclaims.
I tell myself it's my impeccable taste in retro-looking clothing and not
the doll-face that earned the compliment.
Class starts. It's quite daunting. I feel like the lecturer won't take me
seriously - I look like a sixties Barbie-doll.
I merely reapply my lip-gloss to stay in character. I have to stay
focussed on my experiment.
Why
do people wear lip-gloss? It rubs off every thirty minutes. You can't even kiss
with lip-gloss. I guess if your kisser puts up with it, he wants to stick with
you. I chuckle.
I'm
funny; I don't need all this makeup.
I avoid getting up too much; I don't want to narcissistically "strut
my stuff" as these heels mechanically make me do.
For
lunch it's four Provitas with cream
cheese and tuna. I ate the remaining dry tuna in the tin and choked a bit. Dieting
is so stupid.
Getting it right
Everything itches: my stockings, my hair and
my face. Most of my foundation is rubbed, lunched and lived off by the end of
the day.
After
class I reapply makeup for hockey and then during the game I get sloshed with
mud in the face. I quite happily announce: "This just proves that all this
dress-up and makeup is useless."
Then I realise, the most ugly thing about me is not my excess makeup or my
normal lack thereof - it's the way I worry about both, like it's something that
could affect the course of my life. It's not.