Blue Moon

Last Thursday, 10:47 p.m., my hair was perfect. The best it's been in 6-1/2 years. Then I went to bed.

That's the way I feel about Jeffrey winning You-Know-What. I hung in there all season, then he won. All that sturm und drang! And for what? I feel duped. Suckered. Oh, I love this word: disenfranchised. I feel disenfranchised.

While we're on the subject, and even if we're not, let me get this off my chest: I am sick to death of aging. And, I guess, someday I will be. I mean, someday I'll glance in a store window and realize my hair is the best it's been in almost a decade, and next thing you know, I'm toast. Right there on the sidewalk. Toast Moving Toward The Light.

Only the way things are going, I wouldn't be caught dead in an open casket.

After Jeffrey usurped the crown, I briefly relapsed with a previous addiction, "Plastic Surgery Nightmares." At one point my husband had given me earphones, so I could watch people's cosmetic debacles while he slept the sleep of the righteous beside me. Now here I was once more, crouched in my jammies before the flickering TV screen, gasping in horror at these cautionary tales. I vowed yet again to be ever mindful that, A., I was broke as a beggar and could never afford any of this shit, and, 2., it could always be worse: not only might I look like I'd been around the block a few times, but also like I'd been sideswiped by a Monson truck the last time around.

I was born with congenital angst. It's a Finnish thing. As a teenager, I remember agonizing over the Big Questions: What is love? Does a broken heart ever mend? Why is there war? How do I get rid of these bags under my eyes? I soon realized the bags were a Finnish thing, too, which sent me into an angst tailspin. In my young adulthood, I wrestled with the concept of Morality: How can I live a moral life? How can I live a moral life and still have fun? How can I live a moral life and still have fun and still look great the next morning?

At this point in my life, things have simplified: I'm living, I'm waking up the next morning. At least, so far.

That's the problem. I wake up and look in the mirror and feel disenfranchised. The once-in-a-blue-moon Good Hair Day notwithstanding. I think it would help to reposition my vanity lights. I know it would help to reposition my underlying facial structure. But, am I that kind of girl? If I had a nest egg...say, $100,000 and a spread in Elle magazine...would I skim a portion off the top to smooth things over? Has it come to this? The Moral Dilemma of My Middle Years: To lift or not to lift...and I'm not talking about palming Milk Duds from the Shop Rite Market. Whatever, it's all moot. The only thing that has any hope of lifting is my spirits. (I'll get back to you on this after the mid-term elections.)

One positive thing about aging: your entire peer group is far-sighted. Without glasses, you all look damn good to each other. Instant air-brushing! Presbyopia: the poor (middle-aged) man's cosmetic surgery.

When Jeffrey wakes up, in his New Improved Life, has he slept the sleep of the righteous? Is his conscience clear? I have my doubts. I can hear him telling me exactly what to do with them, too. But what does any of this have to do with that age-old Question? Or is that old-age? Nothing. It has nothing to do with anything. Which is what the Wise Ones tell me...Age is just a number, it has nothing to do with anything. To which I reply, It's a number all right, the number of times I can keep going around this block before my knees give out or I end up on latenight cable.

Not that I begrudge Jeffrey his victory. He's looking into his own mirror. Like the rest of us. I'm just curious, did he have outside help gilding it?