When I finally succumbed to the television pitch, all I really wanted from life was my own "facelift in a box." For 30 bucks and a wait of four to seven business days, my 40-ish face could appear perky and rested with the help of special tape. That's what the lady on the commercial said.
Yes, I would normally consider myself above such hooey, but then my own type of late-night logic took over: a) What is the difference between a product that instantly lifts my facial skin and, say, high heels or a girdle or an under wire bra⢠b) What if the product really does work, and I'm the only one left without perky facial skin⢠And c) This is journalistic research.
I got out my credit card and dialed the number. A young man named Jason answered. I panicked and hung up on him. Dialed again. Somebody named Rafael answered. Again my mouth was frozen and I ditched him, too. What was wrong with me?
I dialed again. Jason.
A 40-ish woman does not want to place her order for face-lifting merchandise with a strapping young man named Jason. (Similarly, my gynecologists are always women.) I hung up on Jason.
On my fourth try, Vera answered. I placed my order. And five long business days later a fresher, perkier Beth arrived at my doorstep in a box.
I tore into it like a new package of Thin Mint Girl Scout cookies.
I had paid 30 bucks for two little packets of what appeared to be butterfly bandages or free-breathing strips.
Following the directions on the accompanying video, I pulled back my bangs and washed my forehead. Then, reaching up around the back of my head I slid my fingers down to my right eyebrow and pulled it upward. Using my other hand, I attached one end of a piece of tape to the skin just above the brow.
When that was safely stuck, I pulled the other end of the tape upward and, gathering skin as I went, attached that end to my hairline. I repeated the same thing on the other side of my head.
Now, I have a sizable forehead, with yards and yards of available skin.
What the commercial did not tell was that after applying the tape you will be left with big horizontal creases in your forehead; little tape bridges spanning wrinkle rivers.
And this face-lifting apparatus is not comfortable. I felt as though my face was a soggy T-shirt hanging from a clothesline.
Smiling was easy, but I added blinking to my to-do list. But my eyes did appear more open, as if my eyebrows had been hiked way up the map from, say, the Ohio-Indiana area to something more along the lines of Maine and Seattle.
My face took on the perpetual expression of, "Oh, really?"
For my first public appearance in face tape, I chose a trip to Broadway with my husband and son. For the occasion, I was spectacularly lifted in all departments: under wire bra, panty girdle, high heels, and a full set of face tapes. I was oozing perkiness.
During the ride there, my husband told me how pretty I looked. I pushed my bangs further down over my tape and said, "It's the yoga."
Is there anything so delicious as that smug feeling of being more beautiful that most⢠Walking toward the theater, I held my head up high.
And then there came a great gust of wind to blow my bangs off my face.
"What happened to your head?" my husband said.
"What head?" I answered, slapping my hand across Maine and Seattle.
"You have something in the corners of your forehead," he said.
"Nuh-uh," I said, smashing my bangs back down.
But the wind proved as powerful as my vanity. Another gust came and exposed me.
"It looks like Mom has Scotch tape on her head," said my son.
I slumped the rest of the way to the theater. During the first act of the show I worked like crazy in the darkness, trying to peel off the tape. It would not budge.
I suppose the best news is that the face tape is not likely to fall off at some inopportune time and set your wrinkles free like rocks from a slingshot. I suppose that's good to know, in case I ever get up the nerve to tape my face again.
