Beauty has got to be more than skin deep

Today I booked myself into a spa facial, 50% off, oxygen enriched, glow all over and lose 69 pounds – sterling that is.

Following the beautician up the winding stairs I arrived slightly puffing and mildly stressed, ready to collapse in a chair to fill out my medical details. All was going well. I prepared to lie, as you do on the form, and pretend I lead the life of a nun. Ten minutes later and I’m wearing my cheap garden centre glasses with the diamanté detail over the contact lenses and have sunk to the floor crouched over an oil lamp candle trying to decipher the small print. Narrowly missing ticking the box for a lactating mother and wrongly ticking the box saying I’d had hip replacements and a pacemaker, salvation finally came in the guise of the beautician took pity on me and raised the spot lights to optimum level so I could see sufficiently to sign the disclaimer.
I was so looking forward to my few moments in heaven. I was to be caressed and pampered to within an inch of my life; the soft and gentle pure oxygen machine wafting over my skin - plumping, hydrating and aerating. Well that’s what the brochure said. I couldn’t wait, bring it on! As a force 8 gale began to whiplash across my face, the accompanying noise was reminiscent of pressure hosing a patio. What was to follow, soothed the therapist, was a cooling face pack, specially mixed to mimic my skins’ makeup. She slapped the clammy, cold goo over my face. Sadly the young lady forgot to tell me that not unlike a death mask, this would set solid in a rubbery film. Mild panic and palpitations gave way to mass hysteria as the rubber set in my nose and ears. Relaxing? I don’t think so. I was in dire need of all the oxygen she had thrown at my skin. Had I absorbed enough to avoid passing out?
Oh and another thing. With a menopausal woman let me tell you - don’t mess with the hair. She’s convinced it’s thinning and anything stronger than a light caress brings on waves of panic. When I finally sat upright, left alone by the beautician to prepare for the world outside I looked in the mirror to see Albert Einstein leering back at me. My hair stuck out in a frizzy halo around my face and the new eyelash tint eerily accentuated my eyes in a way not seen since Michael Jackson’s Thriller video. I took a picture on my phone and texted it to my friends. If only to make them feel good about themselves and have a cheap laugh at my expense.

I perused the diamonds in the jewellery shop on the way to the car. Rough diamond? I looked like I’d come straight from the mine.