Love smart people talking real.

Don’t like a message that sounds like it’s just telling me what it thinks I want to hear.

Macleans  May 10/2010

Every parent should read this brilliant and uncomfortable article about “The Empty Lives Of Teenage Girls”. I know these girls, the binge drinking, the kids who cut themselves. Thankfully, they don’t live at my house, but I could name them. It kills me. I’ve known them since they were 3. My high school kids have had health concerns too because of homework demands. Too easily did I recognize the plasticity of the lives they create for themselves, where 7, 13, and 17 are barely different any more.

Dr. Leonard Sax proposes much to reflect on in this interview. The girls and the boys are using these behaviors for very different reasons. Generally, the high-achieving girls are the most at risk, because of the anxiety they live with. Can you remember the crushing levels of stress in high school that our children live with? I can’t. High school wasn’t easy, socially or academically, but it wasn’t what it is now.

My answer was not to cut out Facebook, the cell phone, and the Junior Prom. It was to tell my kids to get lower grades. If homework isn’t done by 10, it doesn’t get done, that’s bedtime. The school can call me.

I allow planned days off from school gladly. Friends are amazed that I am teaching them to hide from their problems and be lazy. I don’t want them to live in a world of time clocks, me vs. The Boss, of their achievement schedule being decided by someone other than them. If their work is done at the end of the week, let them be innovative and self-determined about where and how. If they can achieve in their sleep, or on an island, they’ve won.

I don’t like to rein in a self-motivated kid and ask them to lower their performance standard, but I equally dislike watching the schools compete on the kids’ backs. They may want to prepare them for university by loading them with course work and forcing them to teach themselves, but Grade 10 isn’t university.

My family doctor made the interesting point that meditation and relaxation may work with adults. Kids do better with a physical outlet that has no competition or goal at the end. They need activity that is pure enjoyment and fun, “sizzlingly hilarious” she called it. Turns out to be hard to find. Even Irish Dance has a recital at the end.

Dr. Sax has a no-nonsense delivery that I appreciate. He isn’t wowed by statistics. He’s been quoted in Macleans previously, discussing boys, in Playtime’s Over and How To Fix Boys. You can disagree with him, but you’ll be challenged, and you’ll interact with your own kids better. As he says, our job as parents is foremost to keep them safe. Not to be their friend. Not to avoid their anger. Not to negotiate incessantly. They cannot make decisions about their safety or well-being. We’re the grownups, but our decisions are not easy ones. I found a lot to help guide me in these 3 articles, and feel more confidence in my instincts and choices.

So, grab this magazine. Worth reading too, so you can be informed at the cocktail party, is the ongoing quest for your attention by the marketers on the sites like Facebook and Google. Google knows what we’re afraid of and has learned, through algorithm, to post ads that we think are relevant (maybe more helpful than the Search results?). Facebook knows a lot more about us. If the advertisers get in, we’ll lose our relaxed time with friends. We’ll have to deflect ads, just like the real world. With 1 in 3 Canadians having an account, the pressure is strong. They’re already squirming their way in.

L’Oreal Telescopic Explosion Mascara

I want to believe that there is a perfect mascara at the drugstore. They’re up against my all-time fave, Estee Lauder Double Wear Zero Smudge, but I just cannot drop $25 for mascara.

I bought Rimmel The Max Volume Flash and found it did next to nothing, about like good ol’ Maybelline Great Wear. I returned it.

There isn’t anything I don’t like about the L’Oreal.

The little sea urchin – spiky ball applicator works really well, extremely so, to apply and separate. It’s not goopy. Others found clumping problems but I really didn’t. I could apply second coats easily. It does not move all day. It comes off easy, very easy, without needing a separate eye makeup remover. It’s $10 or less. It’s not animal-tested. It does not create ridiculously fake looking lashes at all, don’t worry about not being able to control it. Very much worth trying. Sadly, only comes in 2 colors.

Garnier Fructis Style Switch

Love Manipulator but it’s too heavy at times, for fine or very layered hair. I wanted something lighter that smoothes, shines, and separates. I no more believe in high end hair products as being so much better than high end makeup. I look for drugstore stuff and it has to be on sale.

This one is just perfect. A dry finished look. Pleasant mild aloe-ish scent. Requires only a tiny amount of product. No hold to speak of, but certainly smooths hair well, cleans up the ends, and adds good shine. It falls right between John Frieda’s Secret Weapon, a superb hair product in its own right, and Manipulator.

Thank you for subscribing to A Greener Tea. If you are subscribing via email, please be aware that in order to comment on this thread, you will need to visit this post on the Web: A Magazine, A Mascara, and Good Hair Goop. Replies via email will be seen only by Christine.

© 2007–2010, Christine Scaman. All rights reserved.

Unless their situation was dire, did anyone really trim their lifestyle?

Maximum natural

Macleans magazine, a Canadian news weekly, had an article on the return of minimalism in fashion in the Business section.

AND

on allowing your natural curly hair texture in “The Lost Art Of Curl Maintenance”. Is knowing how to cut this hair a lost art? I know many women who would say YES!! The confidence of feeling natural in your own skin is freedom from the fight.

The times must be a’changing when Macleans devotes space to this.

Minimalism, they say, is the natural outcome of an economic downturn. Fashion houses are hearing the toll of the credit (or debit) bell. They have to scale down the extravagance for awhile. I for one will enjoy it while it’s given.

Clothing, hair, makeup, as art is great. The problem is that it trickles down till we feel inadequate if we don’t mimic it in some way, instead of seeing it for the costume that it is. When women can’t breathe, move, eat, or walk, we’ve gone back 200 years, haven’t we? Gwyneth might look glam when she needs help to get down 3 stairs, but we are not her.

Scope on the Meatless question

Best was the article “Save The Planet, Stop Eating Meat”. Issues come along that we agree we should have a better grasp of, and this is one. Toyota’s problems will go away, and whether I understand the Middle East or not will make no difference.

The Meatless issue impacts the planet’s health, but yours and mine in a very immediate way too. Micheal Pollan’s book The Omnivore’s Dilemma changed my life (did you know that he wrote a version for teens? I didn’t till now), and I will find time to read In Defense Of Food. I know that animal welfare and lakes of manure and CO2 emissions matter, but when the scale of the problem becomes too pervasive, I feel a bit hopeless. I get that each of us plays a role, but it’s easier for Simon Cowell and Ellen to be vegetarian, or anything else they  decide to be.

Meat is just what we got used to building meals around. It’s what the bacteria in our kids’ bodies got used to eating, so they insist on more or they feel unsatisfied. We have no time to boil chick peas for 2 hours. We feel uncomfortable when our 10 year old announces they’re going vegetarian, because now we have yet another activity. The husband would grumble because nobody is going to tell him what he can and can’t eat.

I want to understand the facts but this issue is mired in the same lobbyism and secrecy that cripples every other big issue. If we looked right at it, it would be too ugly, too scary, and too big. We let someone else look after it so we don’t have to. They don’t let us anywhere near it.

Macleans articles are fair and multi-faceted. I can get a handle on the larger topic by reading 4 pages. I understand the history and the arguments, and not sound like an idiot when the subject comes up. This topic will not be going away and the sooner I get it, the sooner my family’s health and sustainability will improve.

Canadians should pick up this issue. We’ll be feeling the difference by next month.

Thank you for subscribing to A Greener Tea. If you are subscribing via email, please be aware that in order to comment on this thread, you will need to visit this post on the Web: This Week in Macleans March 29 2010: Forced To Get Real. Replies via email will be seen only by Christine.

© 2007–2010, Christine Scaman. All rights reserved.

David Livingstone’s “contemporary avatar of fashion” (in the same article) is worth the price of the magazine. It’s a guy’s perception of a woman who follows the 2010 fashion recommendations, like the ones in the photo layouts later in the magazine.

My question about the whole “What Is Sexy?” thing is this : Did anyone ask any guys?

Who knows a man who insists that women in gladiator platforms are sexier? And is that the man we want?

Mr. Livingstone’s subtitle refers to the quiet celebration of minimalism’s return. I’m pretty sure he speaks for the crowd.

Also worth noting that this is a good Canadian fashion magazine that can be subscribed to at incredible discounts, like $6 a year, certainly not more than 10.

Thank you for subscribing to A Greener Tea. If you are subscribing via email, please be aware that in order to comment on this thread, you will need to visit this post on the Web: This Month In Elle Canada March 2010 : Is Minimalism Sexy?. Replies via email will be seen only by Christine.

© 2007–2010, Christine Scaman. All rights reserved.

Celebrities in bikinis has been done and done again. This cover seemed a little more real.  This page at Amazon shows the previous issue’s covers (and there are only 7 in total). Click on See Larger Image And Other Views under the picture. Some covers have the requisite barely dressed babes but one doesn’t really expect otherwise. There’s a 1 year subscription at Amazon for $10 in the US only (not fair).

The magazine targets women under 40, maybe under 35, but I still found I could relate to every article.

There was no talk of sex unless it pertained to health or improving body image through strength and personal empowerment. I didn’t have to hide the magazine from my kids. In fact, I encouraged them to read it. This has also only rarely happened with a woman’s magazine before.

The workouts are real and not too hard-core or pumped.

I firmly believe and know and am convinced that

-       you can work out without a gym membership

-       you can buy great looking clothes without spending a lot

-       you can have great skin without buying $50-a-bottle cream

The article Get Slim Without The Gym asks 4 trainers to come up with 4 moves each, using 4 pieces of equipment that cost less than $50 together. Loved it.

There is a great feature on common sports-induced aches, their causes, and their (drug-free) remedies.

The issue is loaded with practical information on how to stay safe and healthy while exercising outdoors. My favorite summer workout is a long fast walk with an elastic strap.  Play Away The Pounds shows some great (hard!) moves to incorporate into a walk using a park bench. Slim Down In A Splash does the same in a swimming pool or ocean.

There is another reason many of you will keep this magazine. It’s the Healthy Food Awards. They considered 46,000 products to find the 50 best tasting and healthiest breakfast, lunch, dinner, snack, dessert, and drink foods out there.

The website has loads of good stuff too. In the US, you get a year for 6.99. Pete’s sake, sign up! Dear God, here’s a full year for free (limited time so the link may stop working depending on when you try it).

The best thing about this magazine is that it feels like it’s for the real world. It doesn’t harp on the weight loss, I-got-to-a-size-6, thing as  much as the health and strength benefits. This is not an anatomy lesson or a journey beyond your outer limits. It is intended, I think, to be a motivator and it does that job well. I learned a lot and felt like none of it was out of reach. Any of us could do it all.

Thank you for subscribing to A Greener Tea. If you are subscribing via email, please be aware that in order to comment on this thread, you will need to visit this post on the Web: Fitness Magazine July/August 2009: A Keeper. Replies via email will be seen only by Christine.

© 2007–2009, Christine Scaman. All rights reserved.

I’m a doctor who wants to own a makeup and color company. I’m a sucker for every transition success story ever told.

More Canada April 2009 is about Joyful Re-invention (click on the magazine cover pic to see a list of contents). It was about finding ways to make change a happy thing.  One brilliant woman left her job in Vancouver, moved to Paris to give guided tours to women tourists of the city she loved. Everyone tried to talk her out of it, of course. She’s swamped, of course. These business ideas are no-brainers. Every city needs this. The whole province of PEI needs it.

Also a good piece on why women tend to be very successful in our second careers, risk-averse that we are (or maybe because of it). And a good article on how the cost of buying mangoes and avocadoes in Canada in December will become out of reach as the cost of transportation and efforts to reduce emissions skyrocket, meaning we need to think of ways to cook rhubarb and beets. The Canadian Model Search Winners seem to be beautiful women in shoes that don’t feel good.

Welcome the midlife change

We all feel a ground tremor right about now. It could be the best thing that’s ever happened. It prevents the next 40 from being just more of the last 40.  Some impatience and craziness is natural. It’s the energy for the change. The fact that we can even HAVE a re-invention, let alone a crisis, is a step forward. We have the possibility to live differently.

Maybe the crisis is pointing you in a bad direction, making you do things you know you shouldn’t. Yes, we all have a right to be happy, but sometimes these actions aren’t going to get you anywhere better. It may look better but listen to your gut telling you it’s going to be a pit of snakes. Listen if all your friends tell you it’s a pit of snakes. If you think you’re coming unhinged, get some solid counseling. If nothing anyone says registers anymore, speak to someone other than well-meaning friends.

The truth about the bad

Having an affair is the cliché of this lifestage. We have all seen romance give way to practicality, to a business relationship. How could it be anything else with 2 jobs, 3 loans, 3 kids, 4 parents, not enough sleep, and a body that hurts more than it used to? The idea of keeping love alive is fine but that doesn’t mean it exists just the way it did 20 years or even 2 years ago.

Nobody has a better marriage, healthier bank account, or smarter children. They may look like they do. If they say they do, they’re lying. They’re expending a lot of energy and cash to maintain the façade. They probably look at you and think of all the things you have that they don’t. Everyone with children, of almost any age, is walking on the edge for 20 years. Unmarried people can’t possibly get it. They’re just exercising the reckless courage of the non-combattant.

Have sensible expectations and remember that nothing stays the same. Romance will be lost from a marriage in the years with young kids. The exhaustion is nauseating. Thursday Date Night becomes Thursday Fight Night. It’s temporary. Just get through the day.

Remember that you’re not doing this alone. Your feelings may be so strong that you think no else has them. It is normal and common to despise your spouse and visualize his death. It is normal and common to dream of having an apartment of your own where nobody bugs you. It is normal and common to believe that you’d be happy to never ever have sex again. Nobody is willing to come out and say it but as soon as someone does, everyone has a story. It is also temporary. Wait it out.

Reframe the picture

Aging is the best thing that’s ever happened to me – but I recognize not everyone feels that way. I’m tired a lot, in Doctor’s offices every 3 months, have lines on my face and age spots, and I could care less. The thing I look forward to most on Friday night is getting into my bed at 8. If all that stuff is the admission ticket to where I’m going, I’ll pay it twice.

You can choose to dwell on the many wonders of youth, but to say it was ALL good would be untrue. The older folks like to remind us that “things were better 50 years ago”. Pffft. Who would go back there, especially as a woman? To a 50 year old, a 25 year old is still a kid, with all the limitations of kids.

If your age causes you to suspect that you’re less than you once were, others will feel the same way. Will you create the very thing you fear? Will you attract what you least want? In thinking about aging as something uninvited, in trying always to evade it, you will bring the negatives closer. Don’t dwell on what you don’t want for too long because next thing you know, you’ll be living it.

The hurricane in your head

Believe in the power that’s there. Feel it physically. Let yourself change and the past not be enough. You are setting yourself free of it. That ship has sunk. Swim away. Swim towards that sunny island.

Could we learn to just be proud to be given the chance to get old? It is denied to so many. The privilege of seeing one’s children grow to adulthood should never be taken for granted. At one time, I thought my obstacles were mountains. If I could but see them clearly, I thought I could dismantle them. Today, I see that there are no mountains. There never were. The landscape is warm and abundant and the fabric is unbelievably rich.

Thank you for subscribing to A Greener Tea. If you are subscribing via email, please be aware that in order to comment on this thread, you will need to visit this post on the Web: Midlife Re-Invention (There Is No Crisis). Replies via email will be seen only by Christine.

© 2007–2009, Christine Scaman. All rights reserved.

I love Oprah. Well, everyone loves Oprah.

I don’t watch the show, but then I watch no TV. I just like who she is and who she’s trying to be. I like the magazine more and more.

Those books in her book club… The fiction plots are suicidally dark. The spiritual guides seem completely without grounding, just floating around in the ether, holding on to nothing.  I’ve tried wearing my tin foil hat, the one with the receivers at the ends of the antennae, but I still can’t get these Buddha-Lite books. Still, any woman with such awareness of her journey will find answers. She’s just following another of the many paths.

Right Brain matters

In this issue, Oprah is interviewing the author of the book I’m presently reading. It’s a book everyone should read if they want to be future-adapted. The book is Daniel Pink’s A Whole New Mind :  Why Right Brainers Will Rule The Future.

Do many of us still belong to a generation that encourages our kids to be accountants, engineers, computer experts instead of cooks and bedsheet designers? I’d have to count myself in.  I’m wrong and doing them harm with my 50 year old advice. Why encourage them to do jobs that machines and Asians already do faster and cheaper and that might not even exist on this continent in 15 years?

What cannot be done by anyone else, here or in Mumbai, is to add the particular stamp of creativity that is uniquely ours. It might be found in the design of the lipstick case, in the emotionally beautiful story that goes with the coat giving it meaning beyond all others, or in the story behind the computer game that gives it value beyond all others.

Right Brain practice

For those of us who are primarily Left Brainers, hope isn’t lost. To succeed in every sense of the word, we first will have to redefine “succeed”. Second, we’re going to have to learn to add some R Brain inputs to our usual L Brain output. In the book, Pink gives us six senses we can develop to get our R Brain cooking.

Every skillset is partially in the gene but can be learned and developed. If you’re not sure where opening up your R brain begins, have a look at Betty Edwards’ most fantastic books, Drawing On The Right Side Of The Brain and Drawing On The Artist Within. See what you can learn to see in a week. These are not books about changing how you draw, they’re about changing how you see, in a very literal sense. Begin with Drawing On The Right Side Of The Brain, the first book. Give yourself 7 days and nothing in your world will ever look the same to you unless you’re already an artist.

The new productivity

The basis of it all is that we’ve reached a point of guaranteed physical comfort. We now have the freedom to think more about what it all means. A candle isn’t light and heat anymore, it’s tranquility and uplifting fragrance. Our homes can’t hold our harvest of stuff. The pendulum is swinging away from accumulation for its own sake to owning less but having it symbolize more.

This has great implications all round. At last, we’re getting beyond what things look like. Hopefully, we’ll make the same progress where bodies and faces are concerned. Pink says that he predicts baby boomers are going to do something astonishing. There are so many of them, together with we stragglers, that our combined mental energies will find a way to give our lives reason and worth.

The new News

Every issue brings stories of how women are being empowered to look after themselves and their families, this time with making bracelets. The article on how women brought peace to Liberia, and the movie of the excellent name (Pray The Devil Back To Hell), also raises my head a little higher for all women. 

I feel good reading Oprah when I see how humans are helping humans. A surgeon and his all-woman team travel to politically dangerous Zimbabwe to correct cleft lip/palate facial deformity in children.  THIS is what should be on CNN every night. It makes you feel good for the right reasons. O is becoming the magazine for the News I want to know, not the horrors they force-feed us.

Does accepting stress help control it?

What I try to come away with and hold on to is the sense of not resisting everything all the time. So the tire was flat, the bank machine ate the card, you weigh 5 lbs more than you want, the window broke, you missed lunch. Why storm and rage? Why not accept and cope? I strive to be one of those people who is inwardly very calm, as Oprah seems to be. The outside may be busy but the center is still. (Those of you who know me can stop laughing. It’s mean and I really am trying.)

In the article on dealing with holiday pressure, and as we know already, it discusses powerlessness as the most destructive type of stress. I don’t know if it’s better to fight and resist all the time or accept. Is accepting a type of resignation and a sign that hope has been lost? The nurses on the surgical team in Zimbabwe notice that the Africans are more accepting of what life brings. Is resisting vs. accepting just a cultural difference or a symbol of our indefatigable belief that things CAN be made better? There were many connected ideas in this issue.

Music and family

 With Oprah, Sissy Spacek, and Suze Orman wearing metallic gold, I was glad to see that they didn’t dress Dan Pink that way. Or Dr. Phil for that matter though a Yuletide tie might have been a festive touch.

Fascinating piece by neurologist Oliver Sacks on music’s ability to break through many forms of dementia, including Alzheimer’s disease.  The comprehension of music penetrates and outlives what the disease has done to the brain tissue.  Sometimes, this ability that music has to shine through the darkness even persists for long periods after the music was heard. Why is this not in commonplace use, I wonder? A short article but I found it rather amazing.

 The best, best line in the whole magazine is where Oprah says “ I don’t know what I love more, my bathtub or my bed”. Why, I think we might be long-lost sisters (or it just proves that all women are long-lost sisters).

Our first outing together after our reunion really should be to go shopping. We’d go to Target and Mark’s Work Wearhouse. We’d discuss the fact that if someone spends $50 on me, I’d really rather not get a bookmark no matter how pretty and functional it is (from the gift suggestion articles). And the ball of 100 hair elastics for my kids… into the vacuum and the cat, one by one, after they’d thrown it at each other a few times.

Thank you for subscribing to A Greener Tea. If you are subscribing via email, please be aware that in order to comment on this thread, you will need to visit this post on the Web: This Month In O Dec 2008 : Feed Your Right Brain. Replies via email will be seen only by Christine.

© 2007–2008, Christine Scaman. All rights reserved.

Thursday! Do you feel  like this?

or this?

No need to write in. I can guess.

I bought a subscription to Elle Canada because it cost $6/year with a coupon in a Clinique bonus. It targets a much younger audience and I usually don’t relate. I was off to a better than usual start with this one, with the Editor’s letter. The rest of the issue was just as good.

But before that, on page 21, what DID they do to Nicole Kidman’s lips in the Omega ad?? I hope they’ve been Shopped, not shot up.  That girl can look stunning or sick. If she could just leave her hair red and wavy, she’d go a long way. 

Editor-in-chief, Rita Silvan, who has very good hair that I especially covet if the curl is her own, writes about fashion’s ridiculously high heels. She describes Julianne Moore, reduced to a teetering tottering woman who could barely make it to the stage to present an award. At that moment, even Julianne Moore made herself ridiculous. Did anyone hear a word she said once she finally conquered the stairs?

Heels that give little lift without losing solid grounding are great. Beyond that, when your walk is shaky, when your knees are oddly bent, when your concentration is on staying upright and alive, when you’re better off sitting politely than getting up and going somewhere, then fashion has made a woman its victim.

So Rita and I agree. When women allow themselves to be diminished by an industry’s fabrication and propaganda about how we should look, just so that industry can continue making money, I get prickly. And when we allow ourselves to be in pain (because stilettos hurt like..) , then we’re even bigger victims.

Natural Resources, on page 40, shows a selection of absolutely beautiful neutral makeup for a tone-on-tone look. The lipsticks are especially appealing. Laura Mercier Aurora will be worth a look; on the Mercier site, I noticed Caramel which I liked even better.

On page 176, Rose is the Beauty News Trend Of The Month. It counterbalances the neutral-to-warm-tones page above with some equally wonderful makeup for pink undertones. Here’s the face ; click the arrows to see the makeup.

Beautiful coats, jackets, boots, very clean lines – a lot of shopping done for you here. The entire issue outdoes itself in coats, bags, and price ranges.

Anne Hathaway, made up to look more interesting than I’ve ever seen her, makes a point about not deciding what you want others to like about you. I’d never really thought about it in that way before. Do we decide “I am funny” or “I am nurturing” or “I am clever” and then work it till it overshadows our other traits? More I think of it, more she might have a point.

The Beckhams have a new his/hers scent. What do these two discuss at the supper table, do you think?  The media would have us believe that they do nothing but get photographed and have enviably successful sex by any standard.

I read every horoscope except my own, to prove that they’re interchangeable. You know, my own (Libra) really was the best match, almost the only match.

25 Beauty Steals… I’m always a sucker for those. There were some things I’ll look at (though less than I’d hoped).

I am all about using food as medicine. Until you’ve got that figured out, you can take all the pills you like. They’ll never work as well as when the diet is there to support them. A full page for each topic is devoted to Foods to Fight Stress, Colds, and Fatigue, as well as Antioxidant and Detox best choices. 

Much more I haven’t mentioned. There was a lot of diversion packed into this $4 magazine.

On the final page, designer Michelle Lowe-Holder is interviewed. Her opinion of celebrity is most apt, particularly from someone in her line of work.  You simply must visit Michelle’s favorite fashion blog at www.stylebubble.typepad.com. For this woman who looks out her windows and sees corn fields, it was time travel. 

Thank you for subscribing to A Greener Tea. If you are subscribing via email, please be aware that in order to comment on this thread, you will need to visit this post on the Web: This Month In Elle Canada November 2008 : Read Every Article. Replies via email will be seen only by Christine.

© 2007–2008, Christine Scaman. All rights reserved.

If you have any interest in makeup, any at all, you will want to know that each October, Allure publishes their Best of Beauty issue. This is the best one ever, with Ellen Pompeo (who looks like a cross between Lindsay Lohan and Kate Hudson) on the cover.

For awhile, it seemed the same products were being recycled year after year. This year’s seems fresher, like they started at the beginning again.

Letter From The Editor

The editor-in-chief is a woman named Linda Wells. I would like this woman (though after The Devil Wears Prada, who knows?). She writes the only Letter From The Editor that I consistently read in any magazine. She seems more indulgent of the stardust and glitz than mesmerized by it.

Linda Wells

It’s never a speech promising how great the issue is going to be. She lets you work that out for yourself. It’s just about a point of view, something she thought about or noticed. Though she travels in entirely different circles, the experience is always one you can relate to. There’s no gushing or raving or taking it all too seriously. She seems more genuine than primped to the teeth.

The issues I NEVER buy

Readers Choice Awards issue are futile. The products never seem to evolve.  Why is anyone still buying Great Lash mascara (unless you want a no-mascara look), or Clinique DDML (you could be getting so much more!) ?  I don’t even want to talk about NARS Orgasm blush (for 80% of women, there are better choices!). The scents are never interesting, the brands names less so, with MAC and CoverGirl being far too heavily weighted.

Chatelaine did a decent Favorite Products article in the September 08 issue. I almost bought it, but in the same magazine was an article about a woman who tortured her children – here if you need to see it.

What are their editors thinking? Am I going bring something so evil, that radiates such horrible energy into my house? And have my kids see it? I remember some years ago an issue with a feature on a woman who was in love with Paul Bernardo. I can’t even bring myself to type what he was all about it, but you can Google him. I warn you, it’s not pretty. Chatelaine must have a very solid readership to print this stuff. I won’t even pick up the magazine any more.

Elegance has one master

Giorgio Armani

The source of the photo is an article in Wallpaper, for his Armani Casa furniture design store in London. The interview is interesting, but even better is the slideshow of Armani interiors. Click under the small kitchen photo to view the gallery. 

 Anyone who’s been to my house will fall over laughing for days to think I aspire to this. I have a long way to go. Actually, the house is too sterile, but visualize some stuff in it and it starts looking less robotic.

Allure has featured Armani’s belief in simplicity in makeup, just as in clothing, in a short article.  His sense of elegance and understatement is, of course, renowned. In these, no one can take his place. I was most comforted by his statement that what he dislikes is “the exhibition of being sexy”. Thank heavens. If there’s one thought that does not cross my mind, it’s whether or not I appear sexy.

A good friend spoke with me recently about a piece on “Why Do You Want To Look Sexy?”, as a follow up to Why To You Want To Look Younger? . I sat, I thought, I read, I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t find a place from which to understand the question because the sad fact is looking sexy, or feeling it, just never crosses my mind. Maybe it’s a sign of pre-menopause.

I do want to look attractive. I don’t go out without makeup. I think about my hair. I’m literally happier on my thin days. But sexy per se, why don’t I care? No idea. I’d like to know though. I need to speak with my friend and technical expert, Rick, about putting polls on this page. How many of us think about looking sexy? Always, never, sometimes?

An SJP aside

On page 186, SJP has the weirdest hair color I’ve ever seen on her. I’m pretty sure that girl is a summer, and when they make her hair the color of corn, or even worse, whatever this color is, the descriptive words escape me, pinkish-brown…, man, she just looks off. Does anyone recall when her hair was platinum (white) blond and shoulder length? I for one thought she looked amazing.

Best of the Best

But the Best-Of pages!! Stupendous. You can tell they worked at this. The choices are mostly beautiful and original. The colors are modern and elegant , though those of you who don’t wear sea-foam green eyelids may differ on that point. What can you say, they’re targeting 25 year olds. You’ll enjoy the outstanding gray eyeshadows more. The Winners lists are here, sans pictures. 

 Any colors from the past are only being re-hashed because they’re still the most beautiful ( and, yes, Orgasm is among them; that color will never go away, it will haunt the beauty galaxy for all time). Brands are spread over the board pretty well, with many expensive choices, but I find it forgivable and expected. That’s often where the best pigments and textures are in makeup (not so with Skin Care).

I appreciated the page devoted to Splurges, Economy, Natural, and Men’s selections.

Is it still the cosmetics industry soaking in you in hype and relieving you of your cash? Of course it is. But if you love the stuff and like to play, and are actually happy to go looking for independent opinions before you buy,  throw this issue in the grocery cart. You will find the fabbiest products in lines you might never bothered getting to know. Your list of things to take a look at next time you’re out shopping is going to grow.

Thank you for subscribing to A Greener Tea. If you are subscribing via email, please be aware that in order to comment on this thread, you will need to visit this post on the Web: This Month In Allure October 2008 : Yes, Yes, YES!. Replies via email will be seen only by Christine.

© 2007–2008, Christine Scaman. All rights reserved.

September 2008′s issue of O, The Oprah Magazine is called Get Your Life Back, with features entitled Too Busy To Live and Oprah’s Cure For Feeling Overwhelmed. Now you know why I bought it. Time is the one thing I have the least of and that Oprah doesn’t have any more of than I do. And, she couldn’t buy more if she wanted to.

Those phrases capture the problem for most of us women who are trying to make some changes and figure it all out. WHEN??? Just when are we supposed to do this??

Everything in this issue was terrific. Here’s the short list :

1.     Tons of beautiful things I actually would buy and could buy! Many finds under $100 . Handbags, jewelry, wine, furniture even. Fabulous stuff. I think they actually went out of their way to fit into real budgets for the millions of us who really do like Target.

 2.     The article about Willa Schalit, with her strong and healing presence , empowering women in Rwanda not with charity, but with fair trade. Lovely items, on sale at Macy’s or online.

 3.     Real life advice on real life questions (questions I actually have!), about money, relationships, speeding morning routines, and health. This is advice you could use, not read and forget. Many myths (like “Will it harm my family that so much of our food is microwaved?”) are deflated with straight up talk.

 4.     The Yes, You Can section, where O’s creative directore Adam Glassman styles 40-something women is really interesting. The women look real, or as close as modern magazines get. He demonstrates how we can look sexy, or arty, mix prints, and more, without looking ridiculous.

Am I the only one who hopes wide-legged pants is a fancy that will soon pass? Maybe I have an aversion because I remember “baggies” when I was in Grade 9. These look exactly the same. Everything looks good if you’re 5’10” and a size 2, but here’s my whole point : WHO IS???

5.     3 10-minute weight workouts that work arms and legs together.  I ripped them out and stapled them together. I’ve been doing a set each day. There’s not even time to sweat! These are good moves that will make a difference. Several are done with eyes closed; presumably, that’s for the balance challenge, without sight to corroborate that upper and lower body are making the right choices at once. There’s also a 10min. Cardio and Yoga plan.

6.     The article “Just Say What You Want, Dammit” . A topic every girl and woman I know (including me) could work on. The article was decent, if the examples were a little extreme. The advice was basically “Keep trying”. Because speaking up is such a weak point for so many of us, I just like the reminder to be kept on the front burner.

I can’t read the minds of others and cannot expect them to read mine. It’s not that they won’t. It’s that they can’t. And yet, most of the time, what you do want is just fine with everyone else, and you could have had it with ease if you’d just said something.

In keeping with the theme of the magazine, there are no long, reflective articles to get through. There is one but it anchors the whole featured section on saving time. The rest is snappy but very engaging.

Even Oprah gets overwhelmed (how could she not?). She writes about re-centering herself, getting back into each moment. My brain is almost never in the now. I live in the future. The closest I seem able to get to the present in by acknowledging all the things I have. So much is right in most of our lives that we need to spend more time celebrating that.

 What else? I was not even a bit nervous to let my 12year old daughter read the entire magazine. I was pleased that she read it! This never happens.

There’s a Merle Norman ad with a lovely grey eyeshadow for a winter (if you ignore the green).

I can’t remember when I’ve enjoyed a magazine so completely. I think you will too.

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© 2007–2008, Christine Scaman. All rights reserved.

Sure enough, on the cover of July 2008 Allure, we have the header in the largest font saying “Get Sexy Now”.

But it was Allure!

I had to buy it. Allure is my gift to myself each month. I have mostly outgrown it but now and again, there is still something that I can identify with. I love to read about products and see what tactics the cosmetics industry has devised to move them. The photography and design are fantastic. The grand claims are silly.

The photo retouching is a thing to behold. Check out the Lancome ad in the front cover for High Resolution Collaser-5X. See how they’ve blurred the edges of the model’s nose? I think they made her nostrils smaller too. They’ve done a whole lot more to that photo, but now I can’t stop looking at that strange, small nose. I guess small noses that diffuse into the face are youthful. It’s how my 10 year old’s nose looks.

The Sex article

I’ve made my peace with my sexiness or lack thereof. If it ever increases or doesn’t makes no difference to me. It really never crosses my mind. Is that odd? Do the women reading this think about how sexy they are?

I guess some do because I see many women my age (47) dressed in far more revealing and provocative clothes than I would wear, presumably to attract the attention of men. Or maybe they just feel attractive without wanting to be overtly sexy, and there’s nothing wrong with that. In my way, I do it too.

The woman who wrote the article, Meghan Daum, has intelligence, which is probably the best marker for sexiness. Looking like one of the undressed 20 year olds in the magazine is sexy in the way that is the least creative or inspired. That’s just a mathematical formula that works.

Youth + Fluffed hair + Tight butt = Sexy.

Linked to source.

Seen it + Seen it + Seen it = Meh.

Brains and strength are better.

Kimberlee Kessler Design. Linked to source.

Of the interviews with various experts in human behavior, the Acting Coach interview was my favorite. Or maybe it was the questions Ms. Daum asked that were great. In looks and youth-obsessed Hollywood, it seems that appearance is only half the battle. Turning time back too far can have an opposite effect from the intended, especially if the behavioral age is reset to match the apparent physical age. The most memorably sexy women are those who have grown up to talk the talk and walk the walk of maturity in all its glory. I couldn’t agree more.

Editor-In-Chief

Linda Wells (linked to Amazon interview)

Linda Wells’ Letter From The Editor is always interesting. She seems to be more a businesswoman and less someone who’s gone off the deep end about how she looks. She has not lost herself in an industry where many have come to believe themselves a little too enthusiastically. Despite what her magazine publishes, her letters always seem to value the person and their contribution over their appearance.

This month, she discusses her disinclination to get teary or otherwise emotional. There are probably other stereotypically female behaviors from which she abstains. I wonder if that’s why she’s Editor-In-Chief of Allure magazine. I also wonder why she always seems to wear black. It must be an urban NYC thing, but she looks like a Summer to me.

She always wears tasteful, neutral makeup. She spoke once of her search for a perfect pink lipstick when her Bobbi Brown go-to ran out. Though there are 10 tubes rolling around at the bottom of her purse, they’re all a little too pink/brown/peach. I feel your pain, Linda. My search is for the perfect peachy brown and I have tubes in my purse, car, bathrooms, kitchen, desk…but they’re all a little too something.

She has also authored a book, shown below.

Listening to your true voice

Cheryl Strayed wrote a beautiful story about her first marriage. He was wonderful, she was 18, and it was just easier to say yes. That awkward untimely voice that told her she wasn’t ready allowed itself to be silenced for awhile.

Eventually, Cheryl realized that safe isn’t right. It’s not true to yourself. It’s just familiar and easy. She’s learned to hear that Yes-you-can voice more loudly. Those other voices that feed her doubts are the ones she’s ignoring now. I’m always a sucker for stories about finding your true purpose and Your Deeper Self because that particular project is on my list as well.

Linked to source.

Back to real life

Didn’t see any makeup I’d buy. Can’t wait for the issue where they do the makeovers on the 3 women in the Total Makeover. It’s one of the few chances to see makeup artists put beautiful makeup on real women. I have found some of my best products from that issue. Too bad it’s only once a year.

So I keep the magazine hidden from my children. They don’t need to see the cover or the article on The Sexiest Peep Show. Now why is Allure printing that? Could they not have tossed in an article on antioxidants and the sun, or working out on hot days? Jeeez.

Next month, Victoria Beckham! Should be interesting.

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© 2007–2008, Christine Scaman. All rights reserved.

On the cover of Vogue (Vogue!) this month is SJP, with the feature title “Let’s Talk About Sex”. Yes, I realize it’s referring to “Sex in The City”, the movie out now.

Move down the magazine aisle a little way and you’ll find June’s InStyle with Cameron Diaz on the cover. She’s talking to us tanning and sex. of course.

Steeped in media sex

I don’t buy those magazines because I don’t want them around the house for my children to see, much less peruse. The topic is too pervasive in our culture altogether. We all know it’s there, but can we have a little break from hearing about it? I expect it in Cosmo which is just a step above soft porn, and Glamour is about the same. But Vogue?? The magazine is supposed to be about style and sophistication.

We don’t need to be fed laughable advice and standards against which we should measure ourselves. Am I showing my age? No, I’m not. I do not accept that. Sex has a place but so do many, many other things and they’re all being pushed aside too. In a world where women spend too much time feeling that they don’t meet expectations on every level, this one is altogether unnecessary to bring into the mix.

The real thorn in my side about sex in media is that the other side, the real-life side, is seldom presented. It’s still a delicate topic in our society. It handles men and women’s vulnerabilities on a physical level and an emotional one as well. Media portrayals of sex, like media breasts, are always perfect, or just 1 or 2 small steps away from what some magazine or movie star pronounces perfect to be.

Photo linked to source

The truth about real-life sex

Real world sex dumps a ton of insinuation and expectation into a relationship, and more so in a marriage, and more so still with children. Nobody addresses the topic in an truthful, unguarded, realistic way for fear of hurting feelings or exposing truths that no one is quite ready to have brought to light.

I’m not interested in bringing them to light either. I don’t think it’s important enough. Relationships don’t break down because of problems in the bedroom unless you live on a reality TV show set. Whether the people are gay or straight, same race or not, the issue is a breakdown in communication or a change in values, not sexual incompatibility. Am I wrong?

The question of how many women out there sleep in the same bed as their husband is another example of a sensitive topic. Nobody wants to be first to say they don’t. There’s some sort of medieval carryover dictating that it might dishonor the sacredness of the marriage bed.

And yet, when you begin talking to women, you find that a good proportion of them move into the spare bedroom or crawl in with one of the kids, or the husband spends much of the night on the couch, whatever they need to get through the next day. But it’s awkward because that’s not how it’s supposed to be according to the marriage rule book.

There are as many ways to get your sleep or have sex as there are people doing it. And they’re all correct as long as nobody is being harmed. If there were only 1 right way, we’d all be doing it. There’s no need to feel apologetic or incompetent or an exception because you don’t meet some set of guidelines written for no real person.

Oprah Magazine article : Why You Don’t Want To Have Sex

A few years back, The O Magazine did an article about how 24 million women don’t want sex. Here is the article, or what must be an excerpt, because I remember it as being much longer. It was from the July/Aug 2000 issue.

I remember this line, “the most romantic thing you can do for me is empty the dishwasher”. It was a very honest article and came out and said some touchy things right up front. But 24 million? More like 224 million. More like 2.24 billion. We all know it. No one will say it out loud.

Put me on an island somewhere with nothing to get done in a day. Serve me food and drink. Ease my financial concerns ; better yet, give me SJP’s bank account. Then, we can talk.

Photo linked to source

But while the strung-out grind of every day is still in place, don’t try to tell me not wanting sex twice a day is because of hormones, nerves, the onset of menopause, emotional frigidity, low thyroid, depression, self-esteem issues, or any other ridiculous reason. It’s because I’m freakin’ tired out and I get up at 5 AM just to have an hour alone. I don’t need Dr. Phil to help me figure this out.

Sex still sells

Is the readership down so the covers have to be made more suggestive to get our attention? Have they done surveys and found that this is what women really want in their magazines? I don’t know. Would as many issues of Vanity Fair sell if Angelina Jolie didn’t look like this on the cover? They didn’t sell one to me because I’m not buying magazines I have to keep hidden.

This is almost a cop-out. It takes no imagination to style this woman in this way. Vanity Fair is supposed to be one of the more cerebral publications.

Presumably if it didn’t sell, the editors would change the content in a hurry. Maybe there are women out there who heed this advice closely. But I think it’s like those diet plans-for-a-week you glance through but would never really take a week to do. You skim through the 30 tips for transforming your sex life, but who does them? When do they ever say anything new? Just one more contrived marker by which women must appraise themselves.

I didn’t buy Vogue. I haven’t read the article. Maybe the article agreed with what I’ve said, maybe it didn’t. I thought it was beneath Vogue’s self-proclaimed mantle of elegance to write “Let’s Talk About Sex” on their cover.

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© 2007–2008, Christine Scaman. All rights reserved.

Searching for a way.

Part of me fundamentally believes that that is not possible. My other part, hopefully a smaller size than the first, is not so sure. Though my intention is to shape my own future, rather than just react to the things that might happen to me, I’m not always operating at full intentional power.

Discovery Girls

As I sit with my tea and the ever-present dog, at 5AM and search around in my head for what’s going on and what I need to work on, what do I spot on the cover of Discovery Girls Apr/May 08 issue but a feature entitled “Dare Yourself To Fail: Don’t Get Stuck at Go”. From there, this article was conceived.

Discovery Girls magazine.

For those of you not familiar with DG, this is a magazine for girls ages 8 & up, published every 2 months. My daughters are 12 and 14, and when each issue arrives, my child count is reduced from 3 to 2 because 1 girl is buried in her room with the magazine for the next 4 hours.

The writing style sounds like that of their best friend or a cool 18yr old, but certainly not parent or anyone over 20. If I offered the same guidance, they would tell me I sounded preachy and clearly didn’t understand their problem. It sounds too cliché, or too much like a lecture, coming from me. When they read it here, they soak up every word.

Responsible media

Winner of many parenting awards, the magazine succeeds in perfectly spanning what the girls want to read about and what I want them to read. It is aimed at cultivating and supporting the power and potential of girls.

In each issue, a group of real girls from around the US are featured. Their faces appear on the cover as well, instead of a dolled-up celebrity. They look, dress, and behave appropriately. Apart from heavy use of a hair straightener and a little gloss, they are as unadorned as they should be. There is enough media promoting resemblance to teenage prostitutes without adding more to the mix.

Teenage girls from DG magazine.

Here, they’re dressed in the clothes you hope they’d come back with if you gave them $40 and sent them to the mall. There is no Prada anything. Girls find affordable fashion, a celebrity feature that offers role model advice the kids accept, quizzes (Are You Too Shy) and the ever-popular Embarrassing Moments. For $US 20/year, this is the cheapest and best babysitter around. The marketing is minimal.

The website is worth a look as well. The homepage is entirely age- appropriate, with polls, a blog, a diary, and other interactive highlights.

Allow yourself failure

My kids LOVE American Idol. I go to bed because the screaming audience makes me edgy. I must admit that I quite like Simon (no, I don’t mean, like like, in the Grade 7 sense). Each of the 3 judges is a great foil for the others, but his words have the most substance. I hope that in his private life, he has a little more humanity and realizes that on Idol, he is being paid as an actor as well as a judge.

This article, entitled “Dare Yourself To Fail : Don’t Get Stuck at Go”, begins with the story of Jennifer Hudson who won the Academy Award for Dreamgirls. She was voted off Idol after receiving the 2nd lowest number of votes 2 in 3 times. Now, 13-yr old readers are hooked.

Some of the advice includes the ideas of changing The Voice Inside Your Head, and Change Your View where you have the choice to see failure as just that, or as something more, namely a step on your road to success. My own favorite was You Define You, which was about ignoring other people’s expectations and limitations regarding You.

These are the ideas that benefit everyone. My kids have heard them from me, but you know the reality of parenthood… they don’t listen to a word you say, but they watch and memorize every move you make. When they hear it here, they’re listening.

The lesson : NEVER GIVE UP

Only by failing repeatedly can you succeed hugely. Where the road leads, who can know? I love the idea that girls can learn at an early age to take some control of their future. Life becomes mundane if you’re just waiting for the next thing to react to.

Like anything, the more you fail, the less each failure matters. You can get better at it! If you got a flat tire each time you drove somewhere, flat tires would cease to have much impact

This is how Winston Churchill said it :

“This is the lesson: never give in, never give in, never, never, never, never—in nothing, great or small, large or petty—never give in except to convictions of honour and good sense. Never yield to force; never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.”
—HarrowSchool, 29 October 1941.

He also said that “success is the ability to go from one failure to the next with no loss of enthusiasm”. His quotations are among the most brilliant, very much what you wish you’d said yourself, and like to think you would have if given a couple more minutes. Take a minute and read more of them here.

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Cover of O, The Oprah Magazine March 2008

Sites To Know : TED

I bought the magazine for one article. “Shift Happens tells of the TED prize. $100,000 and the help to realize a dream are given to 3 people who must propose a world-changing wish.

I consider the TED conference to be a testament to human imagination, creativity, and capacity for vision. The conference was mentioned in the article The Abuse of Permission Marketing. In California, once yearly, by invitation only, the world’s greatest thinkers are given 18 minutes to speak about their field of interest. The topics range from music to psychology. TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, and Design. Every speech stirs you to look beyond yourself and imagine what the world we share could be.

Our interconnectedness is humanity’s magical gift, if we could only learn to use it. In the same way that the internet brings us together as equals, so do the TED conferences elevate and inspire us. You can watch spectacular performances and contemplate how our history shapes our destiny. This is a site we must know. Look through the Themes A to Z directory and listen to a few of the speeches. Every single one is mind-opening.

This article concentrated on the prize itself, to whom it has been awarded, what their vision was for its use, and which industries and private citizens came forward to aid in its implementation.This month, a cosmologist who studies black holes, a writer, and a religious historian will reveal their dreams. With the attention of the world for a few minutes, they carry the weight of inspiring all of us to be remarkable.

How others see us

I loved “Am I Doing This Right?”

2 women do their hair and makeup as they normally would. Then, a hair and makeup artist do their version. Since I am fascinated by the difference in how we see ourselves and how others see us, this was the second article I read. First I looked at each woman and wondered what I myself would do differently. Then I looked at what makeup artist Mally Roncal did.

It was lovely and very real. I simply loved the nude and caramel lips. These are the neutral makeup colors women should wear. And it looked like the makeup on the older woman was done without shimmer, just as it should be. There is a very fine glow product on the cheeks, I think, but in that place, it works well to make the skin look moist and healthy.

It annoyed me deeply that they did not say what products were used. The article was about the makeup, for Pete’s sake! I had to make my own copy of the lip colors by mixing L’Oreal Colour Juice in Peaches N Cream and Caramel Crème. Still, this is the type of irritating omission that prevents from buying magazines regularly.

L’Oreal Colour Juice lip gloss

I was glad to see how full lips could be created without using tingling glosses. Does anyone actually believe those lip glosses work to make lips look fuller? Your lips might feel a little puffier, as they sting or feel numb. But really, on which of your friends do you think you can tell a difference with a plumping gloss? I have never found those products to truly plump anything. The color, the shimmer, the application, maybe. The prickling feeling? Never.

It would be my dream to have myself re-invented by someone with good taste. I really have no idea what I look like, what my good or bad features are, or what I could do better, but I certainly would love to learn.

Make yourself happy

“5 Things Happy People Do” was full of associations for me. As you may have read in this blog, I am on a journey towards My Deeper Self. I hope that you join me on that trek. That’s where the best stuff will be, the true awareness and creativity. One of the means to get closer to that place comes from a life spent playing to your strengths and your true joys, doing what your special gifts allow you to do with ease and with fulfillment.

The article tells of a belief held by the Greeks in Aristotle’s time of each child being born with a personal ‘daimon’, the incarnation of their highest being. Since I’m reading the Golden Compass trilogy, where the soul of humans is not within them, but external in the form of an animal, I was fascinated by that this ancient idea exists.

The article describes other aspects of creating happiness in your life, because you do create it, by design and intention. An excellent presentation at TED by Harvard psychologist Dan Gilbert shows us that we have no idea what will make us happy, and more importantly that we can make the feeling of happiness. We are capable of chemically manufacturing happiness. How incredible that is. We can choose to make ourselves happy. This is also related to the article Hey, Universe, Are You Ignoring Me? Do we really know what is best for us?

Natalie Portman’s books

There’s a small feature with Natalie Portman who discusses a few books that made a difference in her life. Though I realize I’m not alone in saying this, this is the one woman whose looks I would trade mine for. Not because I think I’m so spectacular-looking, but because I think that she is. Absolutely could not be improved on, in my opinion.

She seems to have an inclination toward dark topics (as Oprah herself does, if you’re familiar with Oprah’s Book Club), war zones, kidnapping, death from despair, and beautiful but tragic outcomes. Since my favorite books are the Confessions of a Shopaholic series, well, I won’t be running out to get these books. In the very few minutes I have to read each day, struggle and misery are not where I want to spend the time.

Confessions of a Shopaholic by Sophie Kinsella

Great recipes in this issue

The Good Carb recipes look fabulous. Even a quinoa recipe!! A beautiful dip with black beans and goat cheese. A pizza crust with a ground cornmeal crust. I never find a magazine with even 1 recipe I’d make; in this one, I’ll make everyone of these. Cookies with oats, apple butter, walnuts, chocolate, and no white flour – these I cannot make because I’d eat every single one the same day. I am not exaggerating.

The Last Page

The What I Know For Sure page this month is about getting paid to do what you love. This is so important, and yet not enough of us ever achieve it, or consciously set up our lives to make sure that it happens. I wrote more about it in Anti-Aging Strategy o What You Love. Spooky how many connections I made in this magazine.

Oprah describes her approach to money as a form of energy. When energy is given, it will, in turn, create. Affording a certain lifestyle is not of primary importance to her. It is the ability she has, through the power of many energies, including money, to help others envision and become their finest selves. It was very eloquently written.

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      I read the article because I’m always fascinated by anyone with a great sense of style. You never see her in an outfit that doesn’t work but she still takes chances in the clothes and accessories she puts together.

The cast of Sex and The City

An imperfect star

      Although belonging to a younger generation than I do (or does she? SJP is 42 years old), she conveys a great generosity of spirit. She has always seemed a little apart from the star-of-the-day crowd, if only because I actually know who she is. The usual sense of a young woman who loves the attention and is mostly interested in furthering her own reputation has never been there with SJP.

      I enjoyed this article because it focused more on who she is as a person than on the details of the adoration most of these women receive. Many of her reflections provoked me to think. It was also refreshing to see that she was wearing clothing from her Bitten line. The pants costs less than $20. The top is Calvin Klein. So it’s a little concession to looking like the rest of us.

Role model to all women

      She lives part of her life in a world where the pressure to transform yourself is enormous, especially after 40, but she has had the grit to resist. As for the demands that she pluck her eyebrows or fix her nose, they “just didn’t stay in my brain for very long”. What a great comment!

      All women surely need role models of an age they can relate to with enough fiber in their character to reject someone else’s idea of ‘good’, or worse, ‘good enough’. Teenage girls are having noses and other body parts reconfigured but nobody cares about them any more than they did before; in fact, they become public property more than ever. It’s as if it gives the media and the public permission to dissect their flaws where before, their appearance was accepted.

SJP cover photo Allure February 2008

      Anyone notice the gorgeous neutral makeup colors?

Raising a child of privilege

      SJP sees her 5yr old son as somehow disadvantaged to be growing up a child of privilege, unlike her own very poor upbringing. Considering what happens to the children of celebrities, I have to agree with her.

      Never knowing want of any sort has its downside on many levels – for instance, it becomes difficult to prioritize in a world where everything is just there for the asking. How do you decide what you’d fight to keep and what you’d easily lose? Everything must appear replaceable-including people. What motivates you? Life just seems to be about acquisition and consumption.

Better without the mask

      Another quote : “I feel strangely better before I go through hair and makeup…. I feel more like me”. I know women with huge intellectual collateral who refuse to indulge a hair and makeup fixation simply because they do not want to present two faces to the world. Others refuse to buy into social expectations of what women are supposed to look like. If they’re not acceptable in their real face, tough. Fair enough.

      I don’t leave the house without a little makeup precisely because that’s not my outside face. I admit that I would be uncomfortable going out without it. It’s just what I’ve become used to. We’re so sure others would judge us differently, but I don’t think it’s true. At least, if anyone does judge you differently, they’re not worth your time. It’s us who begin to judge ourselves differently. That’s where the path of ‘not good enough’ begins. It’s so hard to resist.

Would you do it?

      So many women of my late 40’s vintage think of having age spots lasered off and breasts done because our “children sucked the life out of us”, as one good friend puts it. Would we really do it if the money were given to us and risk were eliminated? OK, I know many of us would. Maybe I would too.

      Would we really like ourselves so much better? I don’t think our husbands care, I really don’t. Some husbands might, but very few, if any, of the ones I know would. No husband worth having would care. They never expected us not to change. They respect what our bodies have accomplished and the physical power that women’s bodies were designed to have.

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