Dirty Word: Thirty
Fighting age every gray hair of the way.
by Mollie Gross
I recently uncovered some reunion photos taken after my husband’s first deployment. In the pictures I was young and tan with cigarette in hand thinking nothing beyond that moment. Who was that girl?
The big bang
Before each reunion, between the waxings and pedicures, I always hit the tanning booth for that perfect sun-kissed bronze. Two deployments later, the damage showed up. I had a wrinkled forehead at 27. No doubt a combination of a constantly furrowed brow during six months of deployment and tanning bed rays. So, I cut bangs and hid the evidence.
What the pluck?
About a year later I was again kissed by father time. While plucking my already blonde and thin eyebrows, I saw it. A gray hair. Nature was being cruel, but I chalked it all up to stress and tried to forget about it.
Bunco vs. Botox
Then I turned 30. I expected to awaken that day with amazing wisdom and maturity. Unfortunately, I had no mental epiphany. Instead, in the mirror I saw the reflection of the canal-sized lines in my upper lip. My bright red lipstick had bled all over my face. The years of casually smoking at bunco had created fissures all around my upper lip. My reflection reminded me of catfish whiskers. I hadn’t touched a cigarette in years, but the damage was done. I spent the rest of the day with my hand over my mouth.
Mouse trap
My adorable 6-year-old nephew drove the point home in his note to me in my birthday card. It said: “Aunt Mollie, I am so sorry you are too old to have babies. I hope we can play together at Disney World.”
Objects in mirror…
One day shortly after the Big 3-0, while shopping for pants, I noticed that my normal size seemed too tight. I didn’t understand, my stomach was as flat as ever. Then I angled my body for a different view in the tall, department store three-way mirrors and saw it. A giant flat butt. A butt that looked like it had slid off its foundation and melted down and over to my hips. I had no idea that my butt had actually been slowly eating up the back of my legs until it consumed it. No wonder none of my pants fit.
Drawing the laugh line
My husband ignored my casual “fishing” comments that I threw out constantly like: “I better change my shirt, this color makes my face look washed out.” He finally drew the line when I threw a fit over a picture developed from my birthday party. He posted it on the fridge. It was one of us with my head thrown back laughing very hard. I screamed at him.
That is when he put a stop to my insane narcissism. He replied, “I want to see it! And those lines all over your face aren’t wrinkles, they are laugh lines. After all the deployments and stress that we have gone through, I am proud of every one you have.”
I hate to admit it, but he was right. I finally saw in that picture a couple laughing and happy to be together again. Instead of associating all the tiny lines on my face with doom and gloom, I could see something very positive. I could look at the lines in my face and say proudly, those are laugh lines and I’m making more every day.
Mollie Gross is a former Marine spouse, author, professional stand-up comedienne and public speaker. She travels to military bases performing her Military Wife Comedy Show. To see her tour schedule, buy a copy of her audio CD, or book: “Confessions of a Military Wife” please visit www.molliegross.com or www.myspace.com/janewaynecomedy.