Pimplin' Ain't Easy
Oct. 7th, 2008 06:53 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
penfield"A crust of bread and a corner to sleep in,
A minute to smile and an hour to weep in,
A pint of joy to a peck of trouble,
And never a laugh but the moans come double;
And that is life!"
- Paul Laurence Dunbar
I woke up today with a zit on my cheek, about an inch from the right corner of my mouth and along the seam of my jowls, about where a fu manchu moustache might leave off.
This morning it was still a stealth zit, lurking just beneath the skin, invisible to the naked eye. In fact, I only noticed it as I was admiring my own chin (using the internationally recognized "thinking man" pose) after a particularly smooth shave.
It was your typical stress zit, swelling with tension underneath the surface and sensitive to the touch, like a subdermal timebomb, a hematoma with autism. Apparently it was lying in wait until I was tired and defenseless before it tried to poke its head out and see what was up.
It was invisible enough that I figured I could just leave it alone without feeling self conscious about it. And I was able to ignore it for most of the day, though it would come to my attention every time I pressed the phone receiver against my face.
Now, though, 12 hours later, I can see that this is one determined zit, announcing its presence on my chin with a rosy glow and gently throbbing with irritation. It is taking all the willpower I can muster not to mess with it, squeeze it into submission, show it who's boss.
It reminds me of high school, where acne was like warfare. While I was lucky enough to avoid saturation bombing, with the generally ruddy and rugged overall complexion, I was constantly defending against smart bombs and guerrilla maneuvers, which would somehow know to strike on the day of a critical oral report, choir concert or Big Date.
And I would poke and prod and squeeze it and so forth, which of course would just make the whole situation worse, like trying to douse an explosion with napalm. But still I would do it just for the satisfaction of retribution and closure. I was the dermatological equivalent of General Sherman, squeezing a zit to spite my face.
And I would envy the fresh-faced teens hawking cure-all formulas and solutions like Clearasil and OxyPads and Noxema Whatever. Those spokesmodels, brilliantly lit and retouched to the point of being two-dimensional avatars, always seemed like the happiest people in the world. God, I hated them.
Obviously I still get these stress zits from time to time, but I am learning to be more mature and less impulsive, to address such trivialities in a thoughtful and patient manner.
I'm just going to grow a beard.
A minute to smile and an hour to weep in,
A pint of joy to a peck of trouble,
And never a laugh but the moans come double;
And that is life!"
- Paul Laurence Dunbar
I woke up today with a zit on my cheek, about an inch from the right corner of my mouth and along the seam of my jowls, about where a fu manchu moustache might leave off.
This morning it was still a stealth zit, lurking just beneath the skin, invisible to the naked eye. In fact, I only noticed it as I was admiring my own chin (using the internationally recognized "thinking man" pose) after a particularly smooth shave.
It was your typical stress zit, swelling with tension underneath the surface and sensitive to the touch, like a subdermal timebomb, a hematoma with autism. Apparently it was lying in wait until I was tired and defenseless before it tried to poke its head out and see what was up.
It was invisible enough that I figured I could just leave it alone without feeling self conscious about it. And I was able to ignore it for most of the day, though it would come to my attention every time I pressed the phone receiver against my face.
Now, though, 12 hours later, I can see that this is one determined zit, announcing its presence on my chin with a rosy glow and gently throbbing with irritation. It is taking all the willpower I can muster not to mess with it, squeeze it into submission, show it who's boss.
It reminds me of high school, where acne was like warfare. While I was lucky enough to avoid saturation bombing, with the generally ruddy and rugged overall complexion, I was constantly defending against smart bombs and guerrilla maneuvers, which would somehow know to strike on the day of a critical oral report, choir concert or Big Date.
And I would poke and prod and squeeze it and so forth, which of course would just make the whole situation worse, like trying to douse an explosion with napalm. But still I would do it just for the satisfaction of retribution and closure. I was the dermatological equivalent of General Sherman, squeezing a zit to spite my face.
And I would envy the fresh-faced teens hawking cure-all formulas and solutions like Clearasil and OxyPads and Noxema Whatever. Those spokesmodels, brilliantly lit and retouched to the point of being two-dimensional avatars, always seemed like the happiest people in the world. God, I hated them.
Obviously I still get these stress zits from time to time, but I am learning to be more mature and less impulsive, to address such trivialities in a thoughtful and patient manner.
I'm just going to grow a beard.
