None of us are getting any younger, and as far as I am concerned, frankly, it is beginning to show. I am spending increasing amounts of money at the hairdresser’s, and in sharp contrast, Man of the House is spending decreasing amounts of money at his barber’s. I noted that I go to the dentist every six months, have my eyes tested every two years, and naturally look forward with eager anticipation to my next cervical screening, but as a generally healthy person, I have never had a proper check over. So over the next couple of weeks, I am embarking on a personal MOT.
Next week I have a Health Check. Or as they are called in our house, a Death Check. After I had handed over the not insubstantial amount of cash to a very friendly lady, I then received a list of less than friendly instructions. The first is that if I am late they will still charge me the full amount. Well they’ve already got my money, so that was nice customer service before I had even got through the door. The second is that you can’t eat and can only have water to drink for the eight hours preceding the check. Mean. The third one is that you have to fill in a questionnaire answering a lot of personal questions, and I assume that if you lie (“Cake? Me? Never touch the stuff”) they will know about it. Unkind. Then at the appointment (assuming that I am not late because if I am I presumably get detention) a complete stranger will come into the room, poke and prod me all over and tell me exactly what is wrong with me, which I wholly anticipate to be pretty much everything.
It occurs to me now that I am paying for someone to tell me that I am not as slim as I thought, as tall as I had believed, my diet not as good as I had hoped and in spite of walking over twelve miles a week with The Hound, I’m not very fit either. They will probably also hand me a black envelope containing a piece of paper with a month and a year printed on it, which if it is sooner rather than later, may be considered a blessing if after all I am indeed using too much oxygen. All in all, and at best, the outcome of this excruciating and expensive experience can only be one of overwhelming disappointment. B minus, Could Do Better.
Last week as part of this regime, I had a hearing test (free at Specsavers if you have any concerns). I have suspected for some time that I have some hearing loss – it’s a family thing. I arrived and after some hearing-related small-talk the audiologist shut me in a booth with some earphones on and I had to concentrate really hard to hear different noises. If I heard a noise, I pressed a button. It was quite a bit more difficult than it sounds. It’s a bit like all of your children shouting at you at once and you being asked to hear the cat meowing at the front door. The test confirmed that I have some hearing loss in one ear that requires further investigation. Of course in certain circumstances, and particularly with three Childerbeasts in the house, one duff ear might be considered a good thing. Now when they kick off (“I was sitting there first”, “get off me”, “that’s mine”) I can simply lie down on the good ear and muffle the sound.
I was trying to come to terms with the inevitable ear trumpet and ear bashing when what I really needed was a boost. Brunette Friend messaged me with what I hoped was cheering news. Nope. She had stumbled across an advert in a department store aimed at women for “sex proof” mascara and wanted me to know that we have all been having sex incorrectly if we weren’t dolled up to the nines. Yes, you too. Unless you all knew about this and haven’t told me. To quote Stephen Fry, more of an oil slick than an oil painting I may be, but I’m not sure a face full of make-up much improves me. And up to that point, I hadn’t really cared. So not only is my body not good enough, I don’t look right either. Shit. We discussed a number of concerns: 1. Are heterosexual women supposed to only have sex if they’re wearing mascara? 2. What is it you are supposed to be doing with your eyelashes during sex that requires your mascara to be sex proof? 3. Is the person in charge of this marketing the same one who gave the green light for that new lovely Ikea dining set that has been in the news this week (google it)? and 4. Did our partners know about this? Grade C. Requires improvement.
To make my middle-class week even worse, I then learnt of an injection pen that is being marketed, mainly to women, to suppress their appetites. And from the speech of the lady who was telling me and the assembled company about it – this is meant to be a good thing. She advised that a fellow female, of whom I had never heard and whose only apparent contribution to society is to market this nonsense, has been shouting about it from the rooftops. Ever the cynic, I suspect that is because this will make her rich. If I have got this right, she both injects herself and starves and starves her body of the nutrients and fuel that it needs in order to function and stay healthy so she can pursue an aesthetic of the absurd. A look that is entirely unrealistic and unhealthy for any woman wishing to live a long and healthy life. And a look that gives out the very strong message that it doesn’t matter one iota if you achieve nothing in your life, it doesn’t matter how long that life is as it is of no concern to be bothered about what is really going on inside your body, or no consideration should be given to what sort of person you are. All that matters is that you have your sex proof mascara on and you look pretty. I wonder what the Death Check people would have to say about that. “Yes Miss Pointless, you look very good in a bikini, but to have abs like that you have starved yourself to the extent that you have stopped ovulating and therefore your womb is knackered and your heart is about to give up.” And I also wonder what their colleagues in mental health would say about rock hard abs and prettiness being marketed en masse as the only thing that matters in life. You can probably guess what I have to say about it and contains quite a few swear words.
It is with no apology at all that I shall be going to my Death Check with no make-up on. I am not afraid to admit that I don’t own sex proof mascara. Neither do I own rock hard abs. I’m not thin. I’m not pretty. But I’m doing my best, and my best does not include teaching my children that crap. The people who know me and love me don’t seem to care about things like that. But I have noticed, that they, and I, do feel quite strongly about cake. Sssshhhhhhhh! If we could just keep that between us for the next week or so.
Natalie Gist 