The Myth of Perfection

My entire life I've felt myself pulled along a track of feminine self-improvement that ultimately evades me. I remember in 6th grade, I would look at the 8th grade girls and think, "When I'm in 8th grade, I'll look like that." The same when I got to high school... The senior girls looked like grownups to me, tall and thin with perfectly coiffed hair and handbags that matched their shoes. When I got to that age, I still felt like a child, though I looked at the freshman girls that year and thought how young they looked, how incredibly awkward, and was amazed at how I still felt that way.

The whole fantasy was relived in college. As a freshman I had long, unbrushed hair and Birkenstocks were permanently molded to my feet... I was a funny little mess of pseudo-hippiedom. It was not attractive and I didn't care. And yet I still looked longingly at those senior girls, amazed at how put-together they seemed in their neat little coats and boots as they took the Metro North into the city to date law students or to go to their publishing internships, or when they were dressed in so-short dresses and too-tall heels to attend some fantastic party with beautiful people in a distant borough I had yet to explore.

I'm always thinking ahead to when I'll finally "get there." Where, you ask? Truthfully, I don't know. To the time when my skin won't break out and I won't bite my nails and I'll know what dress to put on for what event and I'll be able to attend a "dinner party" without feeling like I'm 40. And when my room will finally be clean and every day will be a good hair day. Maybe someday I won't pass out after a night of drinking only to wake up with my contacts still in and my bra still on, with mascara gluing my eyes shut and my skin tattooed with the imprint of the seam of my jeans. I know there are 24 year olds out there with perfect bodies and hair and nails, with their bank accounts in order and their college diplomas hanging on their walls, who are able to hold a martini glass with confidence, who can teeter around in stilettos all night and not cry from the pain. Where are these women and why am I not friends with them? And moreover, would I even want to be? Probably not. They seem pretty boring.

I haven't bitten my nails in 3 days, a feat I'm very proud of. I just got new highlights in my hair that I spent far too much money on, a feat that I thought I'd be proud of but really, it just seems vain at this point. Once again I've resolved that I'll work out more, or take a ballet class. Clearly, I'm still clinging to this myth that if I transform my outer self somehow, my inner self will suddenly become wise and confident and I'll know all the secrets to...I don't know what. Inside, however, I still feel like that 6th grade girl, gazing up at the 8th graders who seemed so old and wise... Only now I realize, they were only 14 themselves and wore way too much eyeliner and curled their bangs in horrible ways and didn't have a damn clue about anything except for AOL and Spice Girls. Much like the women I see on the subway every day... They might be older, wiser, richer... But I have the sneaking suspicion that they're still just as clueless as I am, even after careers and kids and endless dye jobs. So I feel that I will never discover the secret that makes one beautiful and confident and perfect, because those things don't actually exist.

I think that in reality, life is just one long series of small discoveries and surprises and changes that don't really lead to anything, just to more of the same delicious craziness all the time... More bad hair days and embarrassments and goals and failures and laughs and eye rolls and spills. There is no end of the road, it's just a series of curves, so that we can't see the destination -- because it doesn't exist. Along the way, I'll bite my nails again, my hair will look terrible, I'll make mistakes with money and makeup and alcohol, I won't have a damn clue what dress to put on, and my feet will hurt from too-tall shoes and I'll have to take a cab home. I'll probably never get to that place of feeling like a grownup, and I'll always look at women just a few years older than me and think, "When I'm their age, I'll be this or that or have this or that and everything will be perfect." Luckily, at this point, I'll know it's just a myth...it's just one that I will probably never stop chasing.