Joan had no idea—could never have imagined in her wildest dreams—that the makeover she had embarked upon not so long ago would result in so many wonderful changes in her life. She now had a gorgeous face, a sexy body, and best of all, a diamond wedding ring the size of a small asteroid on her well-manicured finger, from her new husband—the very last doctor she met in the previous chapter. Imagine. Marrying your own plastic surgeon!
I have a philosophy about being a celebrity. Most people get to see you once in your life. So you should look good when they see you. You’d better look good, because after seeing a celebrity, no one asks, “Was he or she a nice person?” or “Does he or she give to charity?” No! They ask, “So what did he or she look like?”
From the very beginning, I always tried to look good so no one could say, “Saw her in a restaurant eating corn—made sense since she was a pig.”
My everyday beauty routine is simple. I get up, look in the mirror, have a good cry, then I exercise. Thirty minutes on the treadmill and training with free weights.
Next, Adele Fass, *my fantastic makeup artist for sixteen years, does my face. She asks two important questions: “What are you doing today?” and “What color are you wearing?” For ten years, the answer has been black. The one time she didn’t ask, I wore red.
I’ve got makeup tips galore from Adele—I’ll get to those in a second. But my point here is that every woman should start her day with the same idea: that anyone she sees, anyone she meets, will be able to report back to anyone else who might care that she looks great.
Every woman should exercise, especially older women, to maintain strength and flexibility and prevent the dreaded osteoporosis.
And every woman should take five minutes out of her morning to slap on some makeup. Very scary when I see myself without any makeup. Gives me the willies. I think, “Who is that old man?”
I’m not pretty without makeup. I was never the natural beauty. No man has ever told me that I’m beautiful. That’s why I do so many procedures, the constant push to look my best. I do think everyone should do whatever she can to look as good as she can.
My mother’s dying words were, “Look good at my funeral. There’ll be a lot of relatives there. You can cry at home.” At this point in my life, I just feel better with makeup on. Everyone wants to look good— and good means groomed, pulled together, elegant.
When I go out without makeup, the doorman pukes on the welcome mat.
I don’t believe makeup should be optional after age thirty-five. You owe it to yourself and to anyone who looks at you to clean yourself up, put on the finishing touches, and dress nicely. The people you see will appreciate it. And, truly, you’ll feel more confident all day long, too. Now that you have a rejuvenated face, don’t give it short shrift.
Polish the diamond!
Following are some finishing touches ideas to keep in mind as you proceed in your new life and new nose/tummy/face:
Moisturize. You should use moisturizer every day. Adele recommends an SPF of at least 15. And you should remoisturize as needed during the day. “If you’re wearing makeup and you start to crack, you can remoisturize by patting or pressing it into your skin. It won’t melt the makeup and makes you look fresh.”
Exfoliate. Once a week. “Give your skin a good scrub with an exfoliating cleanser. I like apricot,” said Adele. “Also, in an ideal world, you should get a facial once a month to exfoliate and clean your pores.”
Some facials do a better job of that than others. A good, old-fashioned extraction facial gets rid of blackheads and rehydrates the skin. But this is 2009, and technology has advanced beyond pinching with rubber gloves. Some of the methods are bull. Oxygen facials? Please! No doctor alive will say this actually hydrates or improves the quality of your skin. You might as well push your dog aside and stick your head out the car window when driving.
One treatment that actually works—according to the studies I read—is the blue-light facial. The high-intensity blue light kills the bacteria? P. acnes, which clogs pores and causes outbreaks of acne vulgaris, otherwise known as zits.
You sit under a blue light for fifteen minutes twice a week for eight weeks. By the end of treatment, your pores are bacteria-free, and no longer erupt into pimples. Monthly maintenance treatments will keep your skin clear. At forty dollars per session (you can buy more cost-effective packages), these facials won’t break the bank. There’s no downtime, no pain, and no risk.
If you have teenage daughters, I’d definitely recommend it for them, instead of painful extraction facials.
Makeup palette. “Makeup changes with the color of your clothes,” Adele said. “If you’re wearing a blue sweater, you can add just a hint of blue to the eyes, with liner or shadow. I do it because it matches my legs. If you’re not sure what you’re wearing, or you think you might change mid-day, stick with neutrals. On the face, use tans and taupes. On eyes, beiges and black. Put peach on the cheeks and go with rosy lips. This palette goes with anything.”
Lips. “When you put on lip liner, keep your mouth in a natural closed position to see the shape you’re making,” said Adele. “So many women do it with their mouths open, with stretched-out lips. It’s like drawing on a balloon, and then deflating it.” Color-wise, for liner, choose a neutral to define the shape and a light rose color for inside. When your lips start to bleed color through the cracks, it’s time to switch from red gloss to blendable neutral liners and lipsticks. You’ve got to tone it down as you get older. A slash of red was great in your twenties. But in your fifties, you don’t want that Granny Goth look.
Nose. The nose can and should be contoured with makeup. First, Adele gives a good powdering and then uses a blend of brown and tan at the base and a soft, neutral, tan flesh tone on the sides and bridge, blended with her fingertip. This keeps the nose from shining, looking too pointy or wide.
Chin. Again, in that potentially shiny part, powder first with a soft, tan blend. Along the jaw, Adele uses a slightly darker shade to take away light reflection, making the line look sharper. She’ll blend it down under the jaw, too. The whole area back to the base of the jaw gets shaded, taking away any hint of loose skin there.
Cheeks. The trick is to contour with a darker neutral just behind the molars. Add a blush on the apple of the cheek. Then, using light brushstrokes, sweep the color, almost invisibly, on the forehead, nose, and chin for a healthy glow. “I use high-quality brushes,” said Adele. “Spending money on quality tools is as good an investment in makeup, as with anything else. You’ll get better results, and the brushes last longer.” A concert violinist uses a Stradivarius for a reason. Adele uses Trish McEvoy
Eyes. Light shimmer is great for just under the eyebrow and in the inside corner of the eyes. Adele always uses neutral shadow on me, unless it’s a red-carpet event and I’m wearing color.
Re: lashes, I’ve worn false lashes every day since 1969. I buy them in bulk, a hundred at a time. They really open the eye up. If you don’t use fake ones, invest in good waterproof mascara. Or try the new formula that supposedly makes your lashes grow longer and thicker. It’s called Marini Lash, made by Jan Marini. It’s got a magic peptide that stimulates growth. I use it—I apply every night for a month—and I do see improvement. It’s worth Googling.
Eyeliner should go along the upper lashline, and then it should sweep up. All makeup should be moving upward. I learned this on “The Ed Sullivan Show” a million years ago. It raises everything and creates the optical illusion of lift.
“A good time-saver is to use products that multitask, like a moisturizing foundation or a powder-based foundation,” said Adele. “Next, fill in the eyebrows with a liner pencil. Put on some lipstick, mascara (or your false lashes), and a stroke of blush. Apply shadow if there’s still time. If not, bring it with you and stroke it on at red lights or whenever you get a second in the course of the day. To start, though, as long as your eyes are defined with mascara and you’ve got color on your cheeks and lips, you’ll have enough polish for the day.”
Anyone can do it. It makes a huge psychological difference, like starting the day on the right foot. People will perceive you differently when you look put together. If you take the time to care for yourself, they owe you their respect.
Not wearing makeup is willfully taking yourself out of the game.
Permanent Makeup. The process of tattooing on eyeliner, eyebrows, or lip definition is called micropigmentation. It’s just like regular tattooing—injecting colored ink into the dermal layer of skin with a needle—but on a small scale.
I have a lot of friends who’ve tried it. One had her lipline tattooed. The problem is that, over time, the tattoos become less defined. After a few years, they fade. On the eyes, this can be good, like a soft smudged liner. On the lips, though, you don’t want a fuzzy line that looks like your hand was shaking when you put on your lipstick.
Hair. I do have thinning hair, but don’t have the time for hair-transplant recovery. What I do instead is darken my scalp with makeup, so it doesn’t shine through like a train coming out of a tunnel. A friend of mine had her scalp tattooed brown. The color faded over time, but that made it look even better, more natural. I wear mini extensions. It’s a tiny ponytail of hair on a clip. I attached the clip to my other hair, and my mane looks filled out and thick.
Some do shake loose though. I’m constantly finding little hair clumps on the carpet. When guests come over, I just tell them the dog is shedding. So far, they haven’t noticed I don’t have a blond dog.
Body. Not to drum too loudly on this point, but women have to put in their time exercising. I hate it. I spend the first ten minutes of my workout trying to talk my trainer out of it. But, at the end of it, I’m glad I did it, not only for my figure but also for my health. Exercise helps prevent osteoporosis. It’s good for the heart. It keeps you limber. I have several friends who are my age and can’t walk up a flight of stairs. The ones who exercise are fine.
Besides my morning routine, I’ve made a habit of taking the stairs. If I drop something, I do a squat to pick it up. When I get off a plane, I walk through the terminal and avoid the moving platforms. And I push my own luggage cart, too. I secretly like it when the power goes out in my building and I have to walk up the eight flights of stairs to my apartment. My mother never exercised in a formal way, but she was running up and down the stairs of our house all day long.
If you want to walk at eighty, you have to take the stairs at fifty, sixty, and seventy. It’s that simple.
Clothes. When you dress, show what you’ve got while you still can. When you get too old, you can’t. There are two ways to go: you can dress for other women, or you can dress for men.
If you’re dressing for women, you want to look chic.
For men, try to look hot, which means short, low-cut, tight, no stockings.
Men don’t appreciate chic. They want to see breasts, ass, legs, bright colors. If you wear pink, it reminds them of a vagina.*
Sexy Is Taking Care of Yourself. Women want to feel good about themselves. And feeling sexy will do it. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and you are the beholder. At my age, all the men are too dead to behold anything. So you’ve got to please yourself.
All the procedures I’ve described in this book are aimed at just that. Feeling good about yourself. Even though plastic surgery has a long history—even though I have a long history with plastic surgery—I feel like this is just the start. Things are getting less and less invasive.
By the time this book comes out, six months from the time it was written, I’m sure there will be loads of new technologies and advances.
By the time my daughter Melissa’s generation is starting to have things done, I bet plastic surgery will be totally non-invasive, that you really can have a lunchtime procedure that’ll give you amazing results.
Remember that futuristic movie Logan’s Run, where no one was allowed to live after age thirty? In the real future, no one alive will look like they’re over thirty. We’ve come a long way since Dr. Frankenstein-type experimentation. One day soon, I’m sure, everyone will have the looks they want, and won’t we all be happier for it?
A Final Touch. I’ve always said, “If everyone around the world got a nose job and lost twenty pounds, there’d be no wars.” If you look good, you feel good. And if you feel good, who wants to fight? So there’s my hidden agenda. I wanted to write this book to end war in my lifetime.
However, while I continue to work on my Nobel Peace Prize, hopefully, as a start, all this information given with much research, thought, and love will encourage you to feel good about yourself and know that you really can be the confident, beautiful woman you dream of being.
Like me.