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Skin
Care and Father Time
by Peary Perry | |
I
suppose there are just some tricks you cannot teach an old dog. Some weeks ago,
my lovely bride went into the local pharmacy and came out with a load of skin
care products for men. These are not cheap.
I have face wash, face scrub,
face conditioner, pre shave lotion, after-shave lotion, shampoo, rinse, and conditioner
and wrinkle stuff. Looks to me like some of the stuff is the same, just in a different
bottle.
I even have a loofta? I guess that’s how you spell it. Looks like
a dried up sponge thing you ‘exfoliate’ yourself with.
That’s sounds nasty
doesn’t it? “I’m going to exfoliate myself.” Might not want to answer the phone
that way. Your pastor might not understand.
Anyway, this sort of thing
is difficult for me to get used to doing on a daily basis. I’m kind of the old
soap on the face; shaving cream and razor then shower and shampoo kind of a guy.
On special occasions I use some after-shave, but a bottle might last me a year
or so, it mainly evaporates.
I can’t remember if I am to use the face
wash or the face scrub, aren’t they the same thing? Seems to me, they are. What’s
the difference between scrubbing and washing?
I didn’t grow up on a farm
so missed out on taking baths with lye soap as some folks have, or so I’ve been
told. I didn’t take baths only on Saturdays either, as some folks. In fact I can’t
remember a day when I didn’t take a bath. I seem to stay pretty clean just doing
what I’ve always done.
But, then taking a bath, shampooing what hair I
have left, and shaving pretty well does it for me. I guess when you get to be
my age; there isn’t a whole lot that can be done to reverse what damage and birthdays
have already done. It amuses me to see these magazine ads with all of these young
people primping and buying millions of dollars worth of stuff each year in their
vain efforts to defy time and gravity.
The
same thing goes for vitamins and health food supplements. I bet I get a catalog
a couple of times a week telling me what all I need to be taking to ward off the
evil effects of bad joints, hair loss, dry skin and a multitude of other ills
and ailments. First off, I can’t afford all of this stuff and second who has time
to sort it all out and keep track of what to take and why? You need an full time
assistant to run around behind you telling you what to take and when to take it.
I can’t afford this.
I’m sure you can do something about prolonging the
effects of Father Time, and from what I’ve seen of the super rich, I think it’s
money. In fact, I’m sure it’s money. However some of those folks don’t look much
better than you and me once you scrape their paint off and put them under real
lighting. I suppose airbrushing or whatever they call it helps out a lot as well.
No, it seems we all suffer the ravages of age, if we manage to escape everything
else.
My bathroom doesn’t have room for all of that stuff and I don’t
think I have time to learn how to use it anyway, so I’ll just keep on doing what
has been working for me for all oft these years. No one has complained so far.
Or if they have, I didn’t listen to them. Or maybe I didn’t hear them, which might
be another problem.
As I’ve often said, ‘If I’d known I was going to live
this long, I’d have taken better care of myself.’
© Peary Perry
Letters From
North America - December 7 , 2005 column
Syndicated weekly in 80 newspapers
Comments
go to pperry@austin.rr.com
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