My daughter and I are applying snail jism* to our faces. She got me started. Here she is at 23, freaking out about non-existence forehead lines. And then there's me. I'm quite a bit older. Let's just say, I wasn't one of those young 30-year-old-mother's on the playground. Or for that matter, a 35-year-old mother. 'Nuff said. So, I suppose if either of us should be stressing about frown lines and crows feet . . . you get me?
My approach in the past has been:
1) Ignorance is bliss
2) Don't look in the mirror too closely
3) Never use those damn magnifying mirrors with a lighting feature they put in hotel bathrooms. Even a 23-year-old can look like Bette Davis from Whatever Happened To Baby Jane!
Recently, my daughter observed that I like to take the quick and dirty approach to things (her words). When I paint, taping baseboards is optional. If there is a chest of drawers against the wall...well, why move it? I just paint around it and pray my sister-in-law never asks for it back.
So, no surprise my skin care regiment is similar. If I wear make-up, I do think about washing my face and tossing on some cream at the end of the day. However, if I apply the tinted moisturizer, bronzer and blush at 7 a.m., you know it's all worn off by bedtime. I'm also a bit cheap. The less I wash my face and apply lotion, the longer the dime-store stuff lasts.
Perhaps not the win-win I've been thinking it is. Standing in the bathroom mirror next to my daughter, scrutinizing my bare face, maybe I should have been applying night cream an inch thick for the last 20 years.
Something about Lizzy and this snail jism has me committed though. Mine is really more of a cream. Hers is a liquid. I bought mine at the pharmacy in Buenos Aires on a layover. For some reason I do know the word caracol is snail in Spanish. The label has a picture of a snail in a shell on a leaf. The lid has a swirly indentation, like the shell of a snail. And it actually says, Baba de Caracol. So, good enough for me. I'm assuming baba translates to jism. Of course, I could look it up or ask Siri, but I've kicked they (discussed in previous blog Leave Me Alone) out of my house and I simply don't feel like looking it up.
Lizzy's snail juice looks more like the real thing. It's viscous and in a slender bottle. You need a little pump action to get it out. The label is in English and bought off Amazon. My cream is made in Argentina, so I'm assuming (yes, once again, assuming) they are South American snails.
Hold the phone! On closer inspection, Lizzy's jism is Korean. That is a game changer. In case you don't know, Koreans take their beauty seriously and deeply (way beyond skin deep). So, I'm sure these Asian snails are probably on some serious juice to create some serious juice.
For three weeks, I've been slathering my stuff on. I'm starting to wonder if it's not promoting wrinkles. Then again, until three weeks ago, I never studied my face morning, noon and night. Who was to know there were all these lines to fear: fine, laugh, frown, vertical, wavy, sideways, etc. etc.
I think of all the times I've walked out on my deck and stepped onto snail slime.** If this beauty regiment works, I'm going to be rolling around naked all over that sticky juice. Maybe a couple will get attached to my face as well!
I'm thinking my daughter's snail jism is the way to go. She's very diligent, pumping that stuff out morning and night and massaging it into her forehead and non-existent crow's feet. Hers really is so slimy and sticky, she has to get up ten minutes earlier to walk around the house and let it soak in and dry. (Mmm, probably because there are no wrinkles for it to attack. It would soak into my skin in nanoseconds.)
I have to say--it is working for her. She doesn't look a day over 24! Come to think of it, she does have her 24th birthday in a couple months. So, she's pretty much on point in the wrinkle-less category. And you know what? I have similar wrinkles to those that are my age.
Now that I've observed this, I can go back to my non-existent beauty regiment! Well, Lizzy does have an extra bottle of her Advanced Snail 96 Mucin Power Essence. I'll use that up so it doesn't go to waste.
*Oh....interesting. While I was doing some fact-checking, I see perhaps I should be using the word mucin and not jism. So, anywhere you see the j-word, just replace it with the m-word. Easy mistake.
**And on closer examination--I'll be rolling around my deck at midnight with the slugs and their juices (not the snails.)
