Pretty in Plaid: A Life, a Witch, and a Wardrobe, or the Wonder Years Before the Condescending, Egomaniacal Self-Centered Smart-Ass Phase (32 page)

Epilogue

Back(Fat) to the Future

I
got rich during the dot-com era.

Then I went broke.

Then I got fat. I guess my mom was right about all that sugar and butter.
²⁰³

So I wrote a book about my experiences called
Bitter Is the New Black
. People liked it, so I wrote another one called
Bright Lights, Big Ass
. People liked that one, too. So I wrote a third book called
Such a Pretty Fat
.

I’ve since married Fletch, adopted a pit bull named Maisy, and my trainer Barbie got me to run my first mile in thirty years.
²⁰⁴

I guess that brings us up to now, the night before I leave for my cross-country book tour.

What I said—“Please give me a loose, casual, messy updo.”

What the stylist heard—“Please fashion my locks into a giant, impenetrable hair bullet.”

What I said—“I’d like my makeup to be light, polished, and natural.”

What the makeup artist heard—“I would like fifteen shades of lavender eye shadow. And boob glitter. Lots and lots of boob glitter.”

Finished in the salon, I sit in the car and stare at myself in the rearview mirror. I look like a Russian mobster’s girlfriend. Yes. This is exactly what I was going for when I forked over three hundred dollars.

I tried to prevent the problem with the hair, telling the stylist it wasn’t what I wanted while she was in the middle of doing it. To compensate, she scrunched the enormous dome she’d created on my head a couple of times to loosen it up. Now I have one piece solid with hairspray, and because of the rumpling, it keeps swinging open on the side like a broken garden gate.

I pull out of the parking garage, doing my best not to mow down innocent pedestrians in my cosmetic distress. I attempt to mellow out by telling myself when I get home I can
probably
turn the dome into a bouncy retro ponytail. And I can likely remove fourteen of the fifteen layers of eye shadow . . . right?

I catch another glimpse of myself at a stoplight. The eyelashes . . . they may be a problem. I asked the makeup artist to supplement my own stubby, thin lash line with some false pieces. She said it would be fifteen dollars for the case of loose lashes and another twenty for the application. Sure, I said. If that’s what it costs, that’s what it costs.

At no point did I realize she’d apply every single last lash in the box in an effort to give me my money’s worth. I couldn’t see what was happening, so I made the (wrong) assumption to trust her judgment.

If I happened to bump into a Vegas showgirl right now, she’d be all, “
Bit much, doncha think?”
Plus, the lashes aren’t even on straight. On my right eye, half of them are facing west, the other half facing east. They come together in the center of my lid in a hairy little teepee. Also? I appear to be cross-eyed.

As I turn off of Michigan Ave and onto Chicago, the rogue bit of hair swings out to the left, hits me in the eye, and gets stuck in the forest of lashes. When I attempt to detangle it all, I almost lose control of the car and narrowly avoid plowing into a family of tourists wearing Navy Pier sweatshirts.
²⁰⁵

On the bright side, maybe no one will show up tonight and there won’t be any witnesses to me in all my Moscow Mafia-doll glory.

In her book
Save Karyn
, the author Karyn Bosnak writes about spotting Stevie Wonder in front of a New York restaurant. She’s so starstruck it doesn’t even occur to her that Stevie won’t see her when she waves.

Save Karyn
is one of my favorite books. I’ve read it half a dozen times, and I particularly love the Stevie Wonder story. So you’d think that when I run smack into Stevie and his entourage in the Admirals Club at O’Hare, I’d have the sense not to wave at him.

You’d think that, anyway.

Since I arrived at the airport two solid hours before my flight, I have plenty of time to call my friend Angie to report on my dumbassedness.

“How many times did you walk by him and wave?” Angie asks. “More than once?”

I hesitantly admit, “Yes.”

“More than twice?”

I exhale. “Yes.”

“More than five times?” I clear my throat. What? The Admirals Club is very dry. By they way, I can thank my author friend Stacey Ballis for clueing me in on the Admirals Club in the airport. She explained that I didn’t have to be an
actual
admiral to join; I only had to have four hundred dollars. “Jen? You still there?”

“I can’t help it if his seat’s on the way to the bathroom. I paid a lot for this membership and I’m absolutely going to make that up in mini-muffins and hot beverages.”

“How many free coffees have you had so far?”

“Also more than five.”

“Is his entourage concerned you’re starting to stalk him?”

“If I pee one more time, then probably. For now, I’m okay.”
²⁰⁶

I hear pans rattling in the background. Angie has the ability to whip up a four-course, five-star, nutritionally complete breakfast for her kids using nothing but spray cheese and tub margarine. She’d be running the world right now if it didn’t interfere with her PTA meetings. “Tell me about last night. Nice turnout at your Chicago reading?”

“Thank God, yes. Great crowd, lots of enthusiasm, and they didn’t laugh at my hair or makeup too much. The only hitch of the whole night is now my face hurts from smiling.”

“Aww . . . you were that happy?”

“Yes . . . but also I got too much Botox.”

Right before the first draft of
Such a Pretty Fat
was due, my editor and I began to talk about author photos for the back page. The pictures on my first two books are a bit posed for my liking. Stacey suggested I should have one that showed my personality more, so I thought it would be funny to print a more informal shot.

Considering how many stories there are in that book about getting high on Ambien and ordering Barbie merchandise, I figured posing with my life-sized Barbie hairstyling head would be hysterical. I took my digital camera and did some arms-out, MySpace-type test shots. Since I can never be alone in any room of this house, my dogs Maisy and Loki tagged along to my impromptu photo shoot, staying close while I tried out various angles.

When I uploaded the photos, the first thing I realized was that posing with a Barbie head and tousled hair and two dogs wrestling in the background makes one look less “upbeat” and “iconoclastic” and more “bugfuck, batshit, ham-sandwich crazy.”

On closer inspection, I noticed how awful my skin looked: leathery, spotty, and in need of some serious ironing. I kept staring at the shots and telling myself,
Oh, honey, the sun is not your friend anymore
. I briefly considered printing out my photos and bringing them to grade schools to Scare Kids Straight into Sunscreen.

Despite my glaring lack of time management skills, I managed to finish the book and couldn’t dwell on what was happening above my shoulders. Shortly after that, my manuscript came back for editing and I got immersed again in work. When I finished the revisions, I found myself with nothing but time.

And a mirror.

And an approaching fortieth birthday. I’m not ashamed of my age, but I kick myself for eschewing sunscreen for all those years. Plus I’m still kind of emotionally immature and I decided I’d be better off if my outside matched my inside.

I began to seek solutions. When I found out procedures like Botox and microdermabrasion cost less than a good pair of boots or one night in a nice hotel, I said
Sign. Me. Up.

I started getting injections right after my birthday and I’ve been thrilled with the results. The only problem is I went overboard this last session because I figured if a few poisonous facial injections are good, then more must be
more
good.

Again, not so much.

Now if I grin too broadly, my forehead offers resistance and my face aches. The sensation is wholly unpleasant. Yet I’ve got skin like a baby’s ass, so you can see my dilemma.

Angie laughs at me. “You’re kind of a moron.”

“Well aware of that, thanks.”

A quick series of beeps goes off on the other end of the line. I assume it’s Angie’s dryer, but she may be initiating a launch sequence. All bets are off with her. “You all stressy about your flight?”

“I’m actually calm. I bought an iTouch and downloaded a bunch of episodes of
Gossip Girl
. I figure if I’m concentrating on whether or not Blair and Chuck will work it out, I won’t worry so much about being airborne.”

“Then forgive me, I take back calling you a moron.”

“I appreciate that. Listen, I’ve got to scoot.”

“Oh, are you boarding already?”

“No, but I
am
about to wet my pants. I’ve got to go find a bathroom in the terminal so Stevie doesn’t sic his security team on me. Talk to you soon!”

I arrive in New York for my first official tour event and it goes well. I’d say the evening is perfect, until the next morning when I start receiving photos on my BlackBerry. I wore a great yellow and white dress. Although this garment is a bit lower-cut than I’d normally choose, it’s so flattering that I couldn’t
not
wear it. I love how it hugs my chest and emphasizes my newfound waistline,
²⁰⁷
and then the fabric cascades out gracefully all the way to a tea-length swirl. This dress hides a multitude of sins.

Except I never tried it on while sitting down.

I’m casually elegant in all the photos where I’m standing at my lectern. Unfortunately, I had no idea that when I sit, the dress gaps and so the top two inches of my black bra showed in
every seated shot
.

Despite my foundation garments being documented for posterity, I take some comfort in the fact that it’s a top-of-the-line bra. Right before the tour, I went in for my first professional fitting. I found out I was six inches and two cup sizes off! (Who knew everything up there was rolling around like a couple of honeydew melons in the trunk?) I didn’t care for the fitting itself because it entailed a stranger moving my b-r-e-a-s-t-s around like a shell game for thirty minutes, but I forgave her when I discovered the right fit trims twenty pounds off immediately.