October 13, 2006

The day after the signing,
we had a full eight hours of movie screenings on our schedule. I was especially
excited to see “Betty’s Treats” as well as a few others. I was excited because I promised that I would attend these screenings and I
never break a promise. Except I didn’t go to any of them. As it turns out, Robin’s friend Sharon made
me an eyelash appointment for that day. 

So instead of keeping my
promises, and watching cool movies all day, I allowed a woman to glue fake eyelashes
in between my own eyelashes for two hours. And let’s just say it didn’t go well.

First of all, she had to
tape my bottom lashes down before she could begin the process, which made me
feel a lot like Alex in “A Clockwork Orange.” And I hate that feeling. 

And secondly, I still have a
little cough left. And so every time
she came near me, I had a little attack, which caused me to jolt forward, so
she was forced to poke me in the eye. With glue. 

And then every time she’d
add an eyelash, I’d say, “Ow!” and she’d say, “Sorry” and then I’d say, “No,
I’m sorry.”

We apologized to one another like this from noon to two pm non-stop, except for
the brief period of time when I must have fallen asleep.

When I looked in the mirror,
I looked exactly the same, except my eyes were bloodshot. I asked her how long
the eyelashes typically last and she said, “one month, but you might want to
fill them in –in two weeks.” And then I got the bill, which we won’t
discuss. 

So then we went home and I
sat in the car, looking in the mirror, all the way home, trying to see myself
with my eyes closed.

That night I had dinner with
my friend Cheryl, (my one and only single friend/ former Ford model –go
figure) who still looks sixteen, even though she’s my age, and Sharon and Robin
and Rory (single male, tall) at a small Italian restaurant near our hotel. We
had a really good time. The food was
delicious, and it’s always fun to look at Cheryl and imagine what it’s like to
be 5’9” and wear no makeup whatsoever.

 

In fact, everything was
going great. Cheryl and Rory were
talking up a storm, and the rest of us were laughing and drinking wine, until
all of a sudden Robin turned to me and said, “What are you doing?”

 “One of my new eyelashes is bothering me,” I explained. “I think she glued it a little too close to
my eyeball. I’m just trying to readjust
it a bit.”

 ‘You can’t readjust them. They’re cemented in. Stop
playing with them.”

And that’s what did it. The
more I thought about not touching them, the more I couldn’t keep my hands off
of them. It took three days but I got
every single one off. I can’t tell you what a relief it was. Of course, I’ll never be the same, what
with the huge chunks of my own eyelashes that are now missing along with the
fake ones, but it was worth it.

The important thing is that I’ll never do another
beauty treatment again for as long as I live. And that’s a promise.