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| It's Your Hair - Do Your Own Thing! |
Obviously our skin and hair has changed but we know that. Unless you've been wearing a potato sack over your head for the last ten years, you've probably been tracking every wrinkle, blemish and age spot.
So why is it that younger women and the media are quite happy to lecture us on what we should look like when we were the ones who came up with many of the trends that are still around today?
Time after time we see the old beauty tips and tricks recycled and presented in the slightly breathless tone so beloved of the few women's print magazines still left in circulation.
I find it somewhat amusing that the 'new' make-up techniques such as baking actually originated in the Drag Community many years ago.
Which probably explains some of the sights I've seen on YouTube.
And then there's the mystery of the 'duck face' selfie.
Any picture containing several teens / twenty-somethings tends to resemble a row of ducks at a funfair gallery.
I dread to think what the photos accompanying CVs look like. How can you possibly look like a potential credible addition to a business when you look like you should be sucking a lollipop and wearing ankle socks?
See the joy of being that, shall we say, little bit older is that you can wear what you want and the World can go whistle.
But then there's the "women over a certain age are invisible" crew.
Do we really vanish once we hit 40? Or do we subconsciously decide to retire from the spotlight?
I'm not suggesting you need a truck load of fillers, eyebrows like landing strips and a day-glo tan to fit in but if you want to make the effort - great.
If you don't, also great.
What you don't need to do is absent yourself from all the things that once gave you pleasure on the basis that you have hit a certain chronological age.
The truth is many are uncomfortable with ageing (me included) and don't know how to treat us.
We are a walking reminder of what is coming (should they be so priviliged to enjoy a long life) so there is the mocking, the teasing, the gentle gibes, the discounting and the all-out ignoring.
The Daily Mail in particular loves its articles about women who have the temerity to still want to compete and who invest in beauty treatments to rival younger women.
"Look at her" crows the Mail, "She thinks she looks half her age".
I doubt she does. But I wish some of these ladies would understand that maturity has its own kind of sexiness, its own power that we should not give away by lessening the beauty we have today.
We need to strive to look comfortable in our own skin - bien dans sa peau - as the French would say.
And then we can wear what we like and it will not matter in the slightest. Because we won't care.
As Eleanor Roosevelt said "No-one can make you feel inferior without your consent".
That's the reminder many of us truly need.
Not another article on hairstyles.
