Pardon My Growing Pains (aka The Blog Makeover)

It's time for a new template, new photo, new colors, new me.

Tonight I feel like a kid with a fresh set of watercolor paint-by-number scenes. I'm experimenting. This evening I've cartooned myself, became a coloring book, a jigsaw puzzle, a maze, a pixel piece, an ethereal other-worldly diva girl, a crinkle face and a ghostlike apparition. Rotated left. Rotated right. (That was painful.)

Retro...

I've been sepia, black and white, sunlit, spotlighted, watercolored, enhanced, enlarged, reduced, resized, revived, renewed and regurgitated.

And fish-eyed. (That was not attractive.)

You're not seeing things.

Your eyes are not playing tricks on you!

The top right picture keeps changing.

Disappearing.
And changing again.

I'm fickle.

A human kaleidoscope.

I can't decide if I want to be full-faced, half-faced (Bud.....are you listening?!), two-faced or a one-eyed phantom.

Dark? Light? Mysterious? Moody? Suzy Sunshine?

I feel so bipolar.

My mother used to say, as my aunt teased my hair (back in the day) and attempted to pluck my tender eyebrows, "Sit still! You have to suffer to be beautiful." Somehow I don't think this is what she had in mind.

My blog is becoming a mirror of me. Oh lucky you.
You get to witness my vanity playing hide-n-seek.

What's even more disturbing is that I've discovered just how "normal" this is for me. I change my clothes more often than OJ changes his story. "Oh! I feel like leggings and a plaid skirt this morning!"
Then I think of Pippi Longstockings and I just can't do it.
Cher comes to mind. Thirty-six inch dangling ear bobbles and 12-inch heels would look very nice disguised in a long Joni Mitchell skirt from the sixties. I'll bring my guitar!

Then I remember I'm afraid of heights.
And I don't have a guitar.

Ten minutes til out-the-door and I'm searching for my bracelet and the other boot I decided to change into. I can apply lip liner, eyeliner and moisturizer with one hand and blow dry my hair with the other. Lipstick does not frighten me. All colors go on - and off - just as quickly as the color code switches in my mental fill-in-the-blank palette. Gouchos morph into pencil skirts and
I routinely find more matching shoes in the backseat of my car than in my closet.
I'm famous for wearing gently mismatched socks to work.

It's dark for Heaven's sake.
If God intended for socks to match He would have joined our feet.
Dressing myself is not always a problem.

Gloss is my friend.
Coffee stains do not mess with me.
Nail polish dries in exactly the amount of time it takes to type a short email with the end of a pencil.
It's a gift.
The length of my skirt is of equal proportion to the amount of sleep I got the night before. Short skirts for that tossy-turny feeling. Knee boots for go-go dancing dreams. (Don't ask)
Ankle boots for those run-for-your-life chasin' nightmares and mid-length "church dresses" if I'm feeling emotional and confessional.

Not all is fun and closet games.
I can be serious you know.
There are several platitudes, beatitudes and attitudes posted on my bathroom mirror. I need inspiration in the mornings. Behold.
"A bounceless hairday is worse than a tetanus booster."
"Alarm clocks are from Satan."
"Matching nails are in direct proportion to the symmetrical size of your brain."
"When God closes one door, He always reminds Mimi where she put her keys."

"Beauty is in the eye of the Maybelline tube."

"Feed the hungry this Christmas. Give manicure sets."

"You may not be able to find your socks but remember what Confucius say -
"Everything has beauty, but not everyone sees it."
Gee thanks, Confu.

Not to be outdone by D.H. Lawrence (who was a tad confused himself) who wrote, "The human soul needs actual beauty more than bread" - which gives me permission to do my best to scrape a little inspiration for mankind out of the bottom of the lipstick tube everyday - trying to find actual beauty. I spend more time in front of the mirror than eating.

I know where my priorities lie.

Mimi morphing is nothing new to me, folks. I've been known to change clothes - and accidentally change direction - in the car. Rear view mirrors are the perfect size for puckering, batting your eyes at a backseat passenger or eyeshadow inspection. Rehearsing your 'pitiful look' a split second before the Officer asks for your powder stained driver's license.

But all mornings aren't nearly as productive as this.

Sometimes I'm really addled.

I think I'll just be me.
No more cartoon Mimis or pencil drawings.
Blog espionage does not become me.
And it's beginning to bother my mother.

But, of course, Blogger does not want the real me. "It" would rather have Disney World photo booth renditions of me(me) with fish lips and googly eyes.
I think that's taking the merger a bit far.

"Hey guys! It's that half-n-half lady again trying to steal more bandwidth by posting the other side of her face. Remember her? She traded that half for enough space to host those pesky peace globes at the top of her cheery little blog. Yea...yea...yada yada yada. That's her, alright.

If I don't get this computer to validate my blog-being soon, I'm going into psychotherapy.


Just as soon as I smash that alarm clock.