Cookies and Cupcakes are an important part of the C-Food Group and an essential ingredient in my beauty regimen.

The Secret’s Out

Don’t hate me because I’m beautiful.

Because I’m not. 

If beautiful is the bullseye at the throwing hall, my axe is stuck in the wall somewhere near the bathroom door. I'm good with that. The last time I tried to create a smoky eye, I looked like I was on the wrong side in the Zombie Apocalypse.

When it comes to beauty secrets, I’m the one everybody kept the secret from.

Oh sure, the potential’s there.

It’s like when Michaelangelo, faced with that big block of marble said, “Maybe if I hit it with a hammer, something will show up.”

I’ve heard that we’re all beautiful, but I think mine is tucked away where you can’t see it, and I’m too lazy to do upkeep on the outside.

I’ve tried every beauty tip in women’s magazines. I’ve been Walking Myself Thin for half a century. I gained 50 pounds. What I lost in years, I gained in cupcake weight.

I bought stylish outfits in the new fashion color, butter yellow. I found that I do better in colors not named after food, since I usually have the real thing spilled down the front of my shirt.

I tried to give my face a pop of color. Remember the old saying “Red Sky at morning, sailors take warning?” The whole fleet was afraid to leave the harbor.

I gave eyeliner a try and almost shish-kabobbed my eyeballs.

So I joined a Facebook group that had 70,000 members, all women.

They talked about their beauty secrets.

Some said they wore nice clothes whenever they left the house.

For me, nice means the dog hasn’t drooled on my pants leg during dinner.

They did things to their eyebrows that I don’t do anywhere on my body. It sounded like what foreign countries do to you when you won’t spill state secrets. One woman had an injury to her eyebrow that she assured us would heal soon. I’m not interested in any beauty procedure that results in a visit from Emergency Responders.

I don’t wax, peel, or laser.

I don’t botox because I may need my facial muscles at any second to give my husband The Look if he tries to tell the gorilla joke.

When I go to my knee doctor, I shave my legs up to the problem site with my son’s head shaver. 

DO NOT TELL HIM!

Beauty sounds too risky to me.

I’ll just sit in my chair, read, and eat cupcakes.

You can hate me for that, but I’d rather you join me.

There’s no dress code.

And there’s enough cupcakes to go around.

 

The Princess and the Papa

In honor of Grandparents Day, September 12, Mind over Mullis is hooking our circus wagon to the About.com Parenting and Family Channel blog train. For me, this one's in honor of my Dad. These days he answers to the name Papa.

My Dad is a tough guy. He wears Black and Decker underwear and buys pallets of toilet paper from the Army-Navy store. He watches sports on television every Sunday afternoon, even if it’s only putt-putt season, and turns the sound all the way down so that the sportscasting guys don’t ruin a beautiful play with color drivel.

He can estimate distance to an eighteenth of an inch and can tell whether a picture is half a bubble off plumb just by squeezing one eye shut and looking through his thumb. He survived the Depression on beans and biscuits; World War II on courage and luck; and 48 years of marriage on Divine Providence and guesswork. He taught four children to drive without suffering permanent neurological damage, made us wear more clothes when we were cold, and refused to let us hang on the refrigerator with the door open until we air conditioned the whole neighborhood.

So how can a five-year-old bundle of brown eyes and rosy cheeks crawl up in his lap at fourth down and goal to go and persuade him to read The Cat In The Hat for the four thousandth time, without suffering severe blood loss?

This man, who refused to allow scented soap in the shower during my childhood years, now has a cupboard stocked with curly noodle soup, sports animal stickers on his back door, and a maintains a gaggle of Barbies who loiter in his favorite recliner.

When I dropped by Dad’s house last Sunday to comfort the old man in his lonesome existence and retrieve his great-grandaughter, I tripped over three teddy bears and a stuffed cat having a tea party, stumbled on a pair of pink plastic high heeled shoes and a glittery feather boa tossed carelessly in front of a full length mirror, and turned my ankle sliding across a nest of scattered crayons and coloring books piled in the hallway.

“Dad!” I called, afraid to endanger myself by advancing further. A trip to my father’s house should not involve my health insurance. “Have you been finding new ways to entertain yourself or is there a little girl hiding in there?”

Giggles erupted from around the corner. “We’re in the kitchen,” a small, freckled voice said. I followed a line of Winnie-the-Pooh stickers posted along the wall at five-year-old eye level and entered the kitchen. Over a teetering mountain of mall-type bags, a pair of large brown eyes twinkled in my direction.

“Can you tell we’ve been shopping?” the bag-mountain asked.

Does the queen wear matching accessories?

“Papa bought me a sticker book, two kinds of bubble gum, and a Shirley Temple video.”

“Shirley Temple?”

“Yeah, she’s a new kid that can dance.”

“If Shirley Temple’s a new kid, Britney's not even in hip huggers yet.”

“Papa made me a new kind of cheese sandwich. You cook it right in the oven.”

“Sweetie, it’s time to go. Gather up your 50 most prized possessions and I’ll take you home.”

She hopped down and ran to me, clutching a battered baby doll that looked like it would be at home in Little Orphan Annie’s boarding house. “I’m ready.”

“What about all your treasures?”

“Oh, Papa bought that stuff for me to play with here. He already took my other stuff home for me.”

I glanced over at my dad, who was nestled in his recliner recovering from the shopping expedition by snoring loudly through the ballgame. He cracked one eye open and peered up at me. “Don’t forget her food. She has Little Debbie brownies, Beauty and the Beast cookies, and Barbie cupcakes. With sprinkles.”

Sure, the queen may have matching hat and shoes and the wealth of an entire nation, but the princess has designer snacks and a Papa who can’t say no.

Beauty Buffet

My mother religiously practiced the Pond’s 7-day Beauty Plan for forty years. I figure if it didn’t work for her in four decades it won’t do me any good to jump on it as a last resort. I wash my face with whatever soap product is melting in the dish and leave off my glasses when I look in the mirror. For all I know, I look terrific.

Why is it that some of us inherit all the withered branches a family tree has to offer and the slobbering weasels of the family get all the good stuff? I got my mom’s body type and the shape of her legs, which were like parentheses from the knees down and crescent rolls from the knees up. I can look in the mirror and see all the food groups represented in my body. Don’t think I enjoy sitting on this rump roast.

With as many can’t miss beauty plans advertised on the market today, it seems like I could find one that would turn my rolls into flatbread. There are plenty of doctors willing to gather up all the folds and trim off the excess. The whole thing seems to be sort of like making a pie crust. Anything that hangs over the sides gets lopped off and redistributed to more deserving areas. They should be able to fashion extra people with all the extra material. We could harvest enough excess flesh from my thighs to create Victoria’s Secret models that resemble humans instead of uncooked spaghetti.

I finally found a beauty routine that seemed likely to make a difference. You use an avocado, two slices of cucumber, and a tomato, and serve it with a large pan of burritos. You won’t be any better looking, but with everybody crowding the buffet table at your dinner parties, no one will notice.