The Lie and the Stye

A recent stye in my eye freed me.

Before I explain how this came about, I want to start with the lie. The lie about aging.

When I was in either the 4th or 5th grade in the early 1980s, we were living in Riverside, California, a city rich with Spanish and Old West history, orange groves, and towering eucalyptus trees. I was in school one day and somehow my friends and I got on the subject of aging.

While I don’t remember how we even got on the topic, I do recall being inside the classroom in between lessons where we were allowed to be out of our seats and milling around. One of my friends said she didn’t want to get old. Others chimed in too about how they were never going to let their hair get gray—like our teacher, Mrs. Celce. Another girl said she didn’t want to look like her grandma—whom she described as a wrinkly raisin.

I looked at my friends in surprise. I thought Mrs. Celce’s hair was gorgeous. It was salt and pepper with a gorgeous white streak that swooped the front of her short feathered layered hair. Both my grandmas were gorgeous, as well. In addition to their beautiful faces, there was a wisdom behind their eyes that said they had really experienced life.

Never one to shy away from making my feelings known, I quite loudly proclaimed, “Well, I’m never going to dye my hair! I can’t wait until I get old. I’m going to be a cool, hot granny who goes skateboarding with all my grandchildren skateboarding behind me!”

That was the first lie. Or rather, the wishful thinking of a 10- or 11-year-old. In any case, I realized my lie by the time I was in my 20s and I saw a few shocking white strands coming in on the middle of my head. By the time I was 23, I was already going gray.

When I was 29, I had the Pepe LePew white streak effect going on in the middle of my head. But I reasoned that I could just dye it and I’d be good to go because my face still looked youthful.

Wait. Didn’t I swear I would never dye my hair? The first time a beautician friend of mine had me bend over the tub in my bathroom in Spangdahlem, Germany to rinse out my hair after dying it, I felt like such a traitor to myself. And a liar to friends whom I didn’t even keep in touch with anymore.

The second lie was that I was going to be skateboarding. I’m not sure what made me choose that activity as part of my aging vision as a kid. I bought a skateboard when I was a teen, and tried to learn. While friends of mine were zooming by on their boards, jumping curbs, and performing kickflips, I was face planting on the road. I made the decision that I just didn’t like anything that moved my feet for me. This included rollerskating and ice skating, though skateboarding was a little better…in that my feet were not affixed to the board and I could leap off before crashing into something.

Balance was not my friend either. So that left out surfboarding and waterskiing too, which all ended in epic failure. Now you can see why I became a writer and not an athlete.

Eventually, in my 40s, I just let my hair grow into its natural, glorious white and silver streaks. My hair was resistant to dye. And the more white that came in, the more evident it became that I was going to have to surrender. Dye jobs would leave me with black hair and a blue or purple streak on the top of my head. Dark brown hair left me with yellow or orange on the top of my head. Red (yes, I actually went red once) gave me a pink streak.

I tried using those hair colored waxy crayon things to cover in between dye jobs, but the white was growing in so fast that the top of my head looked like a waxy mess. The things we women do to ourselves to fight the aging process! Tired of the nonsense, I made the decision to stop the insanity and just embrace au natural Chris.

Of course, people didn’t make it easy. I had several co-workers tell me at the March Air Reserve Base Exchange, “You should get that covered up. You’re too young to start looking that old.”

Gee thanks. I would if it didn’t make me look like a freak after from self-applications and professional jobs that seemed to do very little to help.

Old ladies would stare at my hair in stores and tsk-tsk at me while frowning and shaking their heads in disapproval because I was letting the gray take over. I would stare right back at them and think: You’re not fooling anyone with your perfectly dyed hair, Granny! You still look every bit of 80.

Over time, I grew to love my natural medley of aging colors and would not change it for the world.

Then came the wrinkles. Slowly at first. The few that I had were getting deeper and deeper over time. No one said anything about them so I lied to myself that they must not be very noticeable.

One day I picked up my son from his monthly delayed enlistment program meeting at his Air Force recruiter’s office. Driving home, I was handing my son an ink pen he had asked for when somehow I accidentally grazed my face with it.

I knew the nib was out because I had clicked it open for him ready to write, and I was pretty sure I had just marked my face with black ink. I was trying to pay attention to the thick traffic on the 215 moving through Temecula, California, so I asked him, “Hey, can you see if I have a line on my face?”

He said, “You mean these two?”

I turned my head and saw that he was pointing between his eyes with two fingers and making line motions up and down in that space. My young, soon-to-be Air Force airman was talking about my damn frown lines. I snapped at him that I meant an ink line and then fumed the rest of the way home. My wrinkles had finally been called out.

By the time I reached my 50s, it was as if all the rest of the wrinkles just appeared in one whack overnight. I woke up one day and thought, as I stared in the mirror, “You are such a liar. You’re actually thinking of Botox, facelifts, and halo laser treatment. What happened to the cool, hot granny on the skateboard?”

In all fairness, I had good intentions at the age of 10 or 11. And then reality hits and you’re hoping no one remembers your promises. But you remember. Oh, do you remember!

With all the ups and downs about getting older, the newest thing that bothered me was my eyelashes. Between 2019-2022, I experienced a series of serious health issues. As a result, I lost quite a bit of hair and my eyelashes suffered. While the hair grew back, my eyelashes remained sparse with gaps. They were also brittle and super short.

There were times I wanted to cry because I would barely touch my eyes, and no less than several lashes would appear on my fingertips each time. I would still wear eyeliner and the pressure of dragging the liner across the edge of my eyelid would leave a trail of little lash hairs falling down my cheeks.

I always thought false eyelashes were not for me, though I do remember thinking my Grandma Lucy always looked so glamorous with them—which she never went without. I had tried them before, but I just looked like a drag queen—or I should say, one who was new to being a drag queen and didn’t know how the hell to put those things on.

My youngest daughter Michaela taught me which ones to purchase and how to apply them. It wasn’t perfect at first, but after some epic fails, I finally got the hang of applying and wearing my new lashes.

My confidence felt boosted when others would tell me what beautiful eyes I had. I no longer felt self-conscious. I began to love what I was seeing in pictures again. I didn’t mind my face staring back at me in the mirror. So what if I had silver hair and wrinkles? I had fabulous lashes! I was a queen, just like my grandma had been!

I quickly learned, however, that lashes are not for everyone and women can be mean. I began to see Facebook posts from friends and family making fun of women’s false eyelashes. Memes ran rampant. Women started to scrutinize my eyes and ask if my lashes were real or not. Then they would make some off handed remark about how they would never wear “spiders” on their eyes…but hey, that it looked good on me.

One day I was watching Shark Tank and a beautiful woman was trying to get the “Sharks” to invest in her false eyelash company. She told them how she had suffered from low self-esteem and how her lashes boosted her confidence. I nodded at the television and thought, Me too, girlfriend. Me too.

Here’s where we get around to the stye and the freedom.

In July 2023—right before I was to go with Rob to his work retreat in Maumee Bay near Toledo, Ohio—my body decided it was allergic to the eyelash glue. Both my eyes swelled painfully. Despite how much they were burning and trying to crust over, I went to the retreat anyway on the hope that if I wore enough makeup, no one would notice. And yes, that included the eyelashes that were the cause of my misery.

I should have gone makeup-less to allow my eyes to heal, but the lashes had become my crutch and persona. I thought I needed them. I wanted to feel pretty. Right after the retreat I would start my journey with GLP-1 medications, but before then, I was at a very unhealthy weight and just wanted one thing on my body to look good. So yes. Lashes please!

Rob and I in 2023 at Maumee Bay Resort. I was hiding painfully inflamed eyelids under makeup and the lashes that were causing the inflammation.

When I returned from Maumee Bay, I went through so many different types of eyelash glues. Even the ones that claimed to be hypoallergenic would cause my eyelids to swell up. That started a vicious cycle of not wearing makeup for days—just enough for the inflammation to go down—and then dressing my eyes up again until the next episode.

Why did I put myself through this? Because I neeeeeeeeded them, remember?

Last year in 2024, I discovered Moxie. They were a brand that specialized in false lashes that didn’t need glue. I had found my saving grace. It didn’t matter, at first, that they were over $40 a pair. $40 a pop every 2-3 weeks began to add up, however . And I didn’t like how long they were. I was starting to feel like Elvira, Mistress of the Dark. They were constantly sold out of the only natural length ones they had. It wasn’t until around the Christmas or the New Year that I decided I had enough. I was just going to let my natural lashes be exposed and stop the craziness I was putting myself through.

With that decision, my confidence went into the toilet once again. I was back to brittle, super short lashes that even the best mascaras could not bring to life.

One day while lamenting about my predicament, Michaela told me that I should try GrandeLash MD, a serum for eyelash growth. I was skeptical. I didn’t want to get suckered into another product. Lord knows I had spent a fortune on products already. I was surprised when she told me that she had stopped wearing false lashes a long time ago.

Like the women in stores and at the hospital, I peered closely at her eyes. I was very surprised they were not fake. Her lashes were so thick and long! I thought she was still wearing the false ones all this time. She told me that the serum had really helped her. It is a product that you have to be consistent with and could take a few months to see good results, but it was worth it in her opinion.

So I decided to go ahead and try it once. I bought the small “travel” size and applied it daily. Within the month, my lashes were growing back in, filling in the gaps. As time went on, my lashes got thicker and they were also growing longer. One day, I dared to rub my finger across my lashes. No little hairs fell down my cheeks. What a miracle!

Combined with the GrandeLash Drama mascara, my lashes suddenly looked as good…no…better…than my false lashes ever did. I was incredibly happy!

Then in July, right before Rob and I went to Philadelphia, I was applying my makeup and thought, Well, if my lashes look this glorious, imagine what they would look like if I took my eyelash curler to them and made them even more dramatic!

That was a huge mistake. I hadn’t touched my eyelash curler in years at that point because my previously brittle lashes couldn’t handle the pressure without breaking off. I pulled it out from my makeup drawer, stood in front of the mirror, raised it to my right eye, and….forgot I was older now.

I didn’t realize just how different my eyes are now. The lids are saggier from age. When I closed the curler down with pressure to get that extra curl I was looking for, I pinched the hell out of my eyelid. Yep. I clamped a sagging wrinkle hard!

With a loud yelp, I let go immediately, but the damage was already done. Somehow it split my eyelid open right above the lash line.

I went to Philly with a hurting eye, but it did not swell. So I continued wearing makeup.

When we got back home, we only had a handful of days before we were to go to Cincinnati. By then, a small bump had formed in the area where I split my eyelid. I didn’t think much of it. I told Rob I would go bare faced for a few days before our next trip and it should heal just fine.

It did not. It got worse and worse until my eyelid ballooned. Damn. Now I realized I had a stye. All because I wanted the extra dramatic effect. Rob told me to quit wearing makeup. I whined that I needed to. He told me I wasn’t going to heal if I didn’t. I whined again that I had to. He said I was beautiful without it. I whined that he was lying.

I went to Cincinnati with full makeup. And came back in pain and a messed up eye.

I should have gone to the doctor, but frankly, I’m so sick of hospitals and doctor offices from my previous 3 year span of being a patient that I felt assured that I could handle this on my own. I made the decision to stop wearing all makeup until I healed.

Now you’ve heard me ramble on about the need to wear makeup, but believe me, I’m not that vain. It goes on once in the morning, and then I forget about it the rest of the day without bothering to check on it.

I made the plan that I just wouldn’t go out anywhere during this time. I would stay home where no one would see me. Oh silly me. I am haunted by Murphy’s Law—if something could go wrong, it will. On day one of no makeup, I went outside with my bare face, bib overalls, and giant sun hat to garden. Our area is normally very quiet and not many cars go by. We have almost 2 acres and a fence around our property. If Rob could put a moat in, he would. On this day, however, it felt like the whole county was driving around, walking by, and, of course, looking right at me waving.

Oh lordy. I turned my back so I wouldn’t have to acknowledge anyone else. But then a car came up our driveway. Surprised at this intrusion, I looked over. A man got out of the car and I realized he was there to read our electric meter, which was on the other side of the house. Unlike other times, however, he wanted to talk. And I just wanted to melt into the grass out of embarrassment. I kept telling myself over and over again after that no one was put off or scared by my bare face and that I had survived the ordeal so I just needed to get over my personal hangups.

In the following days, I really started to ponder on the fact that I had become so removed from my genuine self—who I really am. When I was a kid, I was called a pretty girl, had a lot of friends, was smart and excelled in school, and really lived life to the fullest…even if it got me in a lot of trouble. I wasn’t wearing makeup then. I didn’t even care about makeup. I was just me…being the only person I knew how to be.

As a teen and young adult, I wore makeup because I was an artist who loved color, but it still didn’t define me. In fact, when I was going through the Security Police Academy in the Air Force at the age of 20, I wore makeup to my first day of orientation. Immediately, one of our instructors, a tiny female buck sergeant, zeroed in on me. Never mind that the other females in my flight were also wearing makeup.

She stomped over to where I was sitting, got in my face and started screaming at me, “What the fuck is on your face, Airman?! You look like a fucking slut puppy! You better not show up in my classroom tomorrow looking like a fucking slut puppy! Do you understand me, Airman?!”

Unnerved by this unwanted and embarrassing attention, I replied with, “Ma’am, yes, Ma’am!”

And I never showed up with makeup again the rest of the 6 weeks at the academy. It didn’t bother me one bit, either. Having a bare face didn’t prevent me from going through my training and becoming a cop. It didn’t prevent me from becoming K-9 either.

So when did it become an issue where I became so woven into this trap of feeling like I couldn’t go without makeup when out in public—and even at home during the day when no one was even around? When did I begin to define myself by what was on my face versus my abilities, capabilities, and natural talents?

At the time I was pondering this a few months ago, I still didn’t have a clue. I’ve since had an epiphany and can pinpoint what may have been the exact defining moment. But that’s for another blog.

One day, I realized that I wasn’t even looking at myself in the mirror. When I would see my reflection I would avert my eyes. Once I made this discovery, I made it a point to actually look at myself and allow my eyes and the eyes in the reflection to engage. It took about a week, but slowly I began to feel a tinge of recognition. That tinge then turned into a familiarity. I felt I was seeing the child I had once been.

Eventually, that familiarity turned into full blown acceptance. I had come back to myself and I was okay with who I was. This was the real me without the masks I had been donning for decades.

I continued to look in the mirror each time I passed one and each time brought me a new gift. Instead of having disdain for my wrinkles, I began to feel fortunate enough to have them. That meant I had lived a long life, a life span that not everyone is afforded. I began to love the crinkles around my eyes. While my frown lines were hard earned, these little crinkles were as lighthearted as the years of smiles and laughter that created them.

Yes, my eyelids were saggy. But my eyes spoke of wisdom both learned from the conventional teachings of education and the unconventional of me living life. I discovered I’d rather be a woman whose softer, smaller eyes speak volumes than a wide-eyed doe of youth and inexperience, which is simply no longer my path.

My eye eventually healed completely and I thought I would jump right back into wearing makeup daily. But that didn’t happen. Instead, I found myself only wearing it a few days a week. After all, I was still getting to know this new/old me and I didn’t want to lose track of her again. As an artist and creative, I love color and decorating…face included. I will never give up wearing makeup completely. It’s the act of creating that fuels me. I am in a space now, however, where I can also take it or leave it. The day I went with Michaela to Urgent Care a few weeks ago without a stitch of makeup on my face was a proud milestone for me.

This has brought about a new sense of freedom that has changed me forever in this second chapter of my life. And to think it all started with a stye.