I get tetchy when a magazine or newspaper piece kicks off with any variation of the phrase: “We all want…”
For example: “We’re all searching for that perfect winter coat”, or: “Everyone’s dreaming of a white Christmas”, or even: “We all wanted Johnson out…”
There are three reasons. Firstly, it’s patronising. Writers are privileged to have a platform to speak to you, but we don’t have the privilege of speaking FOR you.
To borrow and sanitise a cliché, opinions are like noses: everyone has one and they’re all different. They should be offered, but never imposed. Like Twiglets.
Secondly, as the writers amongst us will secretly know: it’s ear-splittingly lazy. The easiest way to phone in several hundred zero-effort words is by stating something as fact, then backing it up with clever, bullet point examples. With no space left for nuance, reflection or argument, you’re done by coffee time.
Thirdly, and most obviously, it’s demonstrably untrue. I don’t know anyone who “updates” their winter coat every season, if, indeed, they ever had a winter coat in the first place. I find them pointless, as it’s really hard to fit my anorak over the top.
Delivery drivers, people with mobility issues and turkeys are unlikely to be dreaming of a white Christmas, and I’m sure that somebody, somewhere – perhaps only the man himself, but the point still stands – didn’t want Johnson out.
Botox? From a dentist?
So, here was me, about to kick off with: “Everyone hates going to the dentist…”, when I stopped, mortified. Whoa there. I actually don’t mind the dentist and would pick an hour in his chair over, say, an hour watching Question Time, any day.
Anyhow, I was at my appointment with my lovely dentist a while back, being brave, having a filling replaced. We were having that familiar “conversation”, where he’s putting me at ease, saying what he’s doing to what’s left of my tooth, asking if I’m planning to go anywhere nice this summer, and I’m gurgling “eveeurghle” and “uh-chuch”, wondering if I’m dribbling.
But, then, the cosy chat takes an unexpected turn. “We offer Botox here too, now,” he murmurs, hoovering gunk from under my tongue. “Yeallych?” I slosh, taken aback.
Has my dentist just promoted his practice’s cosmetic enhancement side hustle, as he drills my decay? How poetically apt. But, Botox? From a dentist?
It swims in my head like “pea and ham? Fae a chicken?” which, if you understand the reference, means you’re old enough for him to suggest it to you, too, so be warned.
The trouble is, it was more than a suggestion. It was a judgement, however unintentional
As usual, I’m too polite to say what I’d really like to, but I manage a dignified, “I-onk-hink-sho hanksh” before letting him finish and leaving to face the day with a numb and evidently wrinkly face.
I wonder why he picked me to have the opportunity of paralysing my facial muscles with clostridium botulinum? I checked with dad and he’s never been offered the procedure in all his decades of check-ups. My husband, too, missed out.
The trouble is, it was more than a suggestion. It was a judgement, however unintentional, and it brings me back to the start.
Don’t be pressured into changing your looks
We must all want to look younger. Don’t we? Do we? Honestly, guys, magazines, dentists, TV ads – I really don’t.
Healthy? Yes, of course. Radiant – there’s a lovely idea, yes, please. But younger? When I’ve put so many years into becoming me? Who would I be trying to impress? Strange men, maybe, the ones who fear female maturity – but, then, who cares what they like? The more I think about it, the creepier it gets.
I exercise, dye my hair, buy gorgeous skincare products and wear make-up, to feel fit and fresh and groomed, not to try and kid anyone, least of all myself, that I’m younger than I am.
Everyone I love knows my age and most, if not all of them, would either be alarmed or highly amused if I had cosmetic tinkerings to try and shave off the odd decade, as I would be for them.
I rejoice in the young ‘uns in my life, with their fresh, healthy beauty, and I take my place in their world with gratitude, excitement, curiosity and soup. I look at my mum, in her eighties and still the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen, and thank the Lord nobody ever froze her lovely face.
Of course, if you want to do it, for yourself, then you absolutely must. I hope it turns out brilliantly.
Just don’t be talked into it by quiet, false friends, the magazine with something to sell, the partner seeking a trophy, the friend who had the thing done and needs validation that it was a good move, the dentist with his hands in your mouth; that’s all on them, not you.
It’s not friendship, it’s betrayal, and I can loudly opine: nobody needs that.
Erica Munro is a novelist, playwright, screenwriter and freelance editor
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