Pica posing with the last falafel - after we shared a vegetarian platter of Lebanese dishes at Basha. She's wearing her "Celestarium" shawl that she knit herself: it's a large circle that includes a picture of the night sky laid out in tiny pearl beads against the dark blue -- brilliant, and gorgeous.
A couple of weeks ago, we had a wonderful visit from Pica, co-author of Feathers of Hope, which also turned ten that very week. Pica and I got to know each other early in our blogging careers, and then became close through The Ecotone Wiki, a collaboration of writers exploring the theme of "place." Many of us have stayed friends, and continued to blog, for all these years.
Pica is a woman of many talents; in addition to being an excellent writer and editor, she is an avid bird-watcher and sketcher (she maintains a second blog, Bird by Bird, for her avian sketches) and a master knitter who has recently learned to spin her own yarn. Like me, she's still a bit of a hippie at heart, a do-it-yourselfer who's intrigued rather than daunted at the idea of, say, making a solar cooker and cooking the vegetables she's grown in her garden that way; she likes making things with her own hands. Right now she's in-between jobs, and to celebrate that transition she fulfilled a longtime desire, and took a trip by train from California across the country and back, to visit her mother in Maine, with various sidetrips to see friends along the way, recording her travels in a sketchbook.
One of Pica's sketches from the trip, of birdwatchers in Massachussetts.
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Somehow - I can't remember exactly - we got onto the subject of personal appearance and getting older, and she told me that her sister in Maine had encouraged her to go to Sephora in Portland to get "a little help and advice". Sephora -- an upscale, hip cosmetics retailer -- has recently opened a shop in the center of downtown Montreal. I'd been inside and admired the packaging of the whole experience, but hadn't bought anything; however, to my complete astonishment, my husband had bought me several Christmas presents there, and raved about what fun he'd had beign helped by a personal shopper who asked him all sorts of questions about me and then recommended products for him to give me - all of which I loved.
"Let's go together!" Pica said. "Look, I was a Sephora virgin
until last week -- you'll see, it will be fun." So off we went, two aging hippies who are into looking "natural."
Well, they were both right: it was quite the experience. We walked into the black, shiny, mirrored store -- dance music was pounding on the speakers -- and some young beauty with a headset offered me a little shopping basket, but I said I wanted some help, so she said, "Sure! Please go over to the beauty bar and I'll call someone to be with you right away." The beauty bar is a mirrored, two-sided, free-standing, well, bar, with tall stools, and is loaded with brushes and tissues and applicators and all the tools of the trade. My personal consultant showed up, and asked what I would like. Taking a cue from Pica's prompts, I said I didn't wear make-up except for a bit of mascara and lipgloss, but was curious about a very light makeup that would "even out" my skin a bit, and about something to help under my eyes.
She took charge. First, using a brush, she painted my face with something called a primer which "protects your pores," so she said. Then she used two different types of a new type of foundation called BB creme, "very light, no oil in these at all" on the two sides of my face, to compare. Then "concealer" under my eyes, presumably to conceal the fact that I've been alive for 60 years and sleeping about six hours a night for weeks. Then powder, so the "concealer" wouldn't be revealed as shiny. Then some blush, since she had obliterated all the color in my face in order to "even things out."
Pica asked lots of interesting questions of our totally bilingual cosmetology pro, whose name was Amina. I mostly held still, amazed to be where I was, putting on my reading glasses every now and then to peek in the mirror.
Funny thing, I actually looked pretty good when she was done, and not "unnatural." And fortunately I made it out of there without spending too much money. When we got home and told J. what we'd done, he was completely disappointed not to have been along - with his camera!
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Pica back in our studio, adding color to a pen sketch while I sketch her. This isn't a great likeness, but I like that it includes her starry scarf, travel bag, and her trusty folding Schminke watercolor set!
The really fun thing, though, was having such a lovely visit with a longtime blogger friend. We sketched together, and talked, and ate, and drank wine, petted the cat, and talked some more, and she even came along to two of the Holy Week services where I was singing, which was a pleasure for us both. Some people seem to feel that online friendships aren't real, or can't be as deep as face-to-face relationships, but that just isn't my experience at all. Reading one another's blogs and communicating by email for a whole decade makes me feel that I know friends like Pica better than many people I see much more often. And on the rare occasions when we meet up in person, it's just a confirmation that, yes, these are very real friendships based on trust, honesty, intimacy, shared interests, love, and commitment over the long haul.
:-) It sounds so fun!
Posted by: Dale Favier | April 13, 2013 at 01:14 PM
How heart-warming a time you both had. Thanks for sharing.
Posted by: Marja-Leena | April 13, 2013 at 02:15 PM
Sounds like a wonderful visit from a good friend. I'd love to try her knit pattern.
Posted by: Lorry | April 13, 2013 at 05:20 PM
This sounds so delightful! Even the Sephora visit, which I recognize isn't necessarily your usual cup of tea (nor mine), but which sounds like a nifty adventure even so.
Posted by: Rachel Barenblat | April 13, 2013 at 05:49 PM
I love, love, love this. I love your sketch of Pica, with all the pertinent details you noted.
Posted by: Lorianne | April 13, 2013 at 06:24 PM
Beth, this is lovely. I feel the same way about the possibilities of online friendships. It was such a long time ago when I first visited you in Vermont, the whole experience of shared blogs so novel and shiny.
Loved going to Sephora with you, it was a fun thing to do. Tell Jonathan we'll take him along next time!
Posted by: Pica | April 13, 2013 at 09:18 PM
The two people who seem to be faced toward us (in the far right of the sketch) in Pica's sketch look so mousy and add to a nervous energy in that sketch. I imagine (without any birdwatching experience myself) that it must capture the tension of waiting for the birds perfectly.
As for the internet friendships being real or not, I wonder if we can push the discourse beyond that binary into a more nuanced thing. Can we explore why you and Pica (and any other internet/blogging friends you have) are friends and why others don't have that experience? In that context it would become clear that you and the people telling your internet friends can't be real friends are talking about two fundamentally different interactions. I know that I feel that some of my older friendships feel cheapened by our internet interactions, but I think that's more to do with the way we interact online versus real life, not the medium's limitations on us.
Posted by: Sharat Buddhavarapu | April 14, 2013 at 03:56 AM
I wonder at this need that we seem to have to look younger or different.
When will men our age be going to cosmetics stores?
When they do what will it mean?
Posted by: ET | April 14, 2013 at 03:35 PM
=)
Posted by: lucychili | April 15, 2013 at 06:30 AM
Sharat, I'd be pleased to discuss the subject of daily-life/internet friendships in a more nuanced way. In particular I'm interested in how you feel some of your pre-existing relationships are cheapened by online interaction - is it that what were once deeper conversations have devolved into briefer, more superficial contacts? I think that is true for me with certain people too.
ET: funny thing, I asked that cosmetologist how many men came into the store to shop for themselves and she said "a lot more than you'd think!" Most of the product lines they carry (especially for skincare, hair, and fragrances) have lines specifically for men.
Posted by: Beth | April 15, 2013 at 12:09 PM
"Cheapened" is the wrong word. Social media (Facebook mostly) is the way I interact with most of those friends, and for me Facebook has this tendency among people my age (I am 21) to turn into a show. Each status is a competition, an unconscious one, I think, for the most likes or the comments turn into "Who can say the next funniest thing or ironic joke, etc.?" Therefore it feels hard to keep up friendships that way. Perhaps its only my network's age, but I see it as an outgrowth of Facebook's choice of quantifying relationships via Likes. I'm no media theorist, but that seems an iffy way to do anything other than collect data to sell to advertisers.
However, the solution to this falls to the individuals in the relationship. I know, and suspect most of my friends know, Facebook is a bit of a circus, but we can change the tenor of our interactions on the medium. I will say that there are a few people who I am in contact with via Facebook chat during my current study abroad trip to India, and conversation flows much more easily that way for me with them. And I do get the feeling I know them better for it.
Posted by: Sharat Buddhavarapu | April 15, 2013 at 11:31 PM
I love the pictures and your description... wish I'd been there! Pica's sketches and her new short haircut are great. Why no photo of the results on you and Pica of the make-up session?
The desire to enhance our appearance is probably more natural than the relatively modern idea of 'looking natural'. The cosmetic industry has taken over what is essentially the ancient human practice of decorating our faces and bodies - an art-form in itself. Whatever one's age, gender or looks, experimenting with make-up, hair styles and colours is fun and invigorating but I would draw the line at cosmetic surgery, Botox etc .
Posted by: Natalie | April 16, 2013 at 09:47 AM
Natalie: And in taking over the human practice of decorating ourselves it has homogenized cultures.
Blue or green eye lids - fine, blue or green lips - not accepted.
Bright red lips for women - fine, men - not accepted.
Heels so high they make it difficult to walk - sexy and acceptable in many circumstances for women.
Interesting creatures, aren't we?
Posted by: ET | April 16, 2013 at 11:28 AM
ET - if you look at glossy fashion magazines - Vogue, Harper's, Elle etc. or at news pictures of the latest designers' catwalking models, there are multicoloured eyelids and lips (yes, blue, green, black!) sometimes on the men too. Maybe not in the US but over here in the UK and Europe there doesn't seem to be anything unacceptable in the fashion world. But of course you're right and these extremes don't generally filter down to the average woman or man on the street.
Posted by: Natalie | April 17, 2013 at 02:33 PM