I stayed overnight in a hotel on Monday night. A basic hotel with an old TV which had only five channels. I ended up watching a programme called Botched Bodies. A gruesome hour of people who, disatisfied with their looks or parts of their bodies, opted for cosmetic surgery to make changes.
Unfortunately things had gone wrong, and the programme featured different surgeons trying to repair the disastrous things that happened.
A lady who I thought was very attractive in her photos, had decided to have fillers put in her cheeks. Unfortunately the fillers became infected, they leaked and she had pus filled lumps on her neck, her face became so swollen.
There was a man who was ashamed of his moobs...after surgery, he was left with unsightly scarring, lost a nipple and had to have a prosthetic one made. Why did they feel the need to go under the knife?
Change and growing older is inevitable for us all.
I've been thinking about that programme this week plus the relentless coverage in the press of stars who have constant nips and tucks, botox, and anything to keep them looking younger,plus the pressure on young women to look perfect.
I'm certainly not, but I manage to avoid seeing the ravages of time too closely because I'm short sighted and there's hardly any mirrors in our cottage. But in that hotel room with very bright lighting and far too many large mirrors, I couldn't help seeing my imperfections. The lumpy bits, the saggy bits, the wrinkles,the scars....let's just say it wasn't pleasant.
But they are part of who I am, they all tell the story of my life...
Here I am this afternoon in the kitchen...the laughter lines show that I smile alot, I like to laugh, and always see the funny side of things...
Closer up by the window the bags under my eyes say I 've not enough sleep this week. And can you see the grey hair at my temples, usually hidden under the rest of the mane? Yes, time is a marching on....and in ten years time, my hair will be a totally different colour as I'm allergic to hair dye.
And the frown lines on my forehead show the sad times, such as the death of my father, my darling brother in law, the loss of a twin in utero,.They show the worrying times...when the children were ill or injured, and the simple fact that I squint and frown like hell in the sunshine.
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The sun damage on my body show that I spent too much time in the sun when I was younger in Africa, there's scars of major operations, and then there's the scars of a car crash three years ago.
My car crashed into a deep ditch nose down, ploughing into a hedge, just six inches to the left of a huge, gnarled old tree. I can't remember much. You can't see the whiplash or the from top to toe heavy bruising now.These scars tell the story of how my arm smashed the glass of my car door on impact, the cuts to the bone, and the pain as a nurse picked out each fragment of glass embedded in the bone.
My arm may not look much to you, but to me the scars are a constant reminder that I'm bloody grateful to be alive. I nearly didn't walk out of that crash.
So all my imperfections can stay where they are, I'll just have to hide the lumpy bits when I go to the beach !
That's not saying that in a parallel universe I wouldn't love to be a size 10, beautiful and with impossibly long legs . But, I live in the real world, where I love my family and friends for who they are, and how they make me feel , not what they look like.
Today's track has to be "Changes " by a man of disguise and master of reinvention. David Bowie.....
