The following was originally published at dearquarantinediary.com on April 8, 2020.
Dear Quarantine Diary,
When I was a kid, I went to bed watching Full House reruns on Nick At Night. I remember an episode in which DJ starts junior high and is immediately confronted by cool girls wearing thick eyeliner and red lipstick.
After eating lunch in the bathroom stall, she decides that she must adapt—she must start wearing thick eyeliner and red lipstick. Of course, her dad, played by America’s sweetheart Bob Saget, likes everything clean, and this includes his daughters’ faces. But Aunt Becky, played by America’s most wanted Lori Loughlin, has a way to compromise. DJ can wear makeup if she wants to, but the key to makeup, she says, is to make it look like you’re not wearing any.
When we’re stuck at home all day, not going out to see the public, do we wear makeup? Even just a little to make it look like we’re not wearing any? Some of us have Zoom as a portal to reveal ourselves to the world, or at least to our immediate academic or professional circles, but is it betrayal to trick everyone into thinking I “woke up like this”? Are other people doing it too?
I don’t put on makeup every day—that would negate one of the only perks of being in quarantine: the ability to lounge around in PJs and a naked face. #NoFilter.
But Zoom life is becoming the new normal. And in a normal world, at least on some days, I would paint Urban Decay foundation on my pink face, swipe three different neutral tones on my eyelids, and widen my eyes as I stroke my lashes with a prickly mascara wand. Just a little bit. So maybe people would think I am an effortless beauty.
It would be easy to invalidate this habit. Even I feel a little betrayed when I see quarantined influencers whose cheekbones couldn’t possibly be that shimmery without MAC cosmetics. But wouldn’t it be a big defeat to surrender our routines? Especially routines that make us feel good about ourselves when we need it most?
Zoom’s Sweetheart,
LRJ
