How Old am I Supposed to Look
from Anne Montgomery
I like
to think – in fact, I believe – that in olden times wrinkles signified
wisdom and dignity. Today, not so much. Drug makers, who are looking to
wipe our faces clean of those evil little lines, are frothing at the mouth to
create a product that smooths our skin, an effort to pump up their profits in
what is an almost one-billion dollar a year industry.
I became acutely aware of
wrinkles as I approached 40. Unbeknownst to me, I was nearing the end
of my on-camera sportscasting career, not because I wasn’t good at my job.
After all, I’d worked for five TV stations, so, logically, I opined,
I must have been a competent reporter. But then, my final contract was not
renewed and not a single TV outlet in the country expressed an interest in me,
despite my credentials, which included working at both the local and national
levels with a stint anchoring SportsCenter at
ESPN.
It took
me a while to catch on. Glimpses of older on-camera women I’d worked with –
especially those framed unforgivingly in HD – more than hinted that they’d had
“work” done. Then I’d look in the mirror. Did I really look all that different
than when I first took my place in front of the camera?
My answer finally came in
rather shocking fashion, a situation caused by years of sports officiating. I
began calling amateur games in 1979. I first became a youth ice hockey
official, which lead to me being certified in football, baseball, soccer,
and basketball. It was those outside sports and silly rules about perception
that doomed me. Until relatively recently, sports officials were not allowed to
wear sunglasses. In fact, many still eschew regular glasses, as well,
opting for contacts, lest they set themselves up for the “What are ya, blind, ump?” retorts that are
often flung at sports arbiters.
My loss
of vision was gradual, but eventually it was clear something had to be done.
Driving at night was difficult, the glare of oncoming headlights excruciating.
I couldn’t see those line drives heading my way and would lose passes and kicks
in the harsh stadium lights. I had cataracts, sadly, thirty years before the
age my parents developed them.
The surgery was quick and
simple. I remember thinking the inside of my eyeballs looked like Jackson
Pollack paintings, all swirling lines and colors. A day or two later, I
stood before the mirror. The haze I’d been looking through for so long had
lifted, my sight clear for the first time in years. I reared back. When had all those wrinkles appeared?
It took
a while, but I eventually adjusted. I had to admit that my face no longer
mattered all that much. Neither my high school students, my beau, nor
anyone I cared about gave a whit about whether I had lines on my face. In
retrospect, it was rather freeing.
But
then one day, while walking by one of those upscale salons in a fancy mall, I
was stopped by a pretty twenty-something woman with an alluring accent and
flawless skin. She stared at me, tilting her head, long hair cascading about
her shoulders.
“Come
in! Please.” She smiled, motioning toward the ornate open doors. "Let's take a
look at your face.”
As I
had a little time to kill, I acquiesced. She put me in a pump-up chair and produced fancy bottles and jars of creams and elixirs guaranteed to make me
look younger. Then she handed me that dreaded little round mirror that
magnifies to the extreme. I’d like to say I had never succumbed to this
particular sales pitch, but I suddenly recalled all those TV years when I
thought nothing of dropping two or three hundred bucks on products like
the ones she was showing me.
I
gazed into the mirror, and then stared up at her. “How old am I
supposed to look?”
She
paused, tilted her head. “Younger.”
“How much younger?”
She
squinted, seemingly puzzled by the question.
“Really?
What age am I supposed to look like?”
She
pouted, thinking. The smile returned as she dipped the end of her
manicured pinky into a blue glass jar. “Younger.”
Then I
noticed my long-time beau standing in the doorway of the salon, a bemused look
on his face, a man who repeatedly, over two decades, had told me that he
doesn’t care if I ever wear makeup or fix my hair or don anything but
jeans and T-shirts.
Though
she practically implored me to buy some of her magic creams, I
declined. As I walked out the door, I couldn’t help but ask her one more time.
“How old am I supposed to look?” When
she couldn’t answer, I smiled and thanked her. Then Ryan wrapped his arm around
my shoulder.
“I love
you just the way you are,” he said.
Back when I worked in TV, the condition of my hair and makeup
was, sad to say, the most important consideration of my day. Years later, I
began dating a lovely man who had an artist draw my portrait. The picture
he chose was from a day we’d been out rock collecting in the
Arizona desert. I had found a lovely stone, which I cupped in my hands to
show him. No make-up. Hair a wild mess.
“You’re the happiest when you’re
rocking,” he said. “This is my favorite picture of you.”
And now, it’s my
favorite too.
Allow me to give you a brief intro to my latest women's fiction novel for your reading pleasure.
The past and present collide when a tenacious reporter seeks information on an eleventh century magician…and uncovers more than she bargained for.In 1939, archeologists uncovered a tomb at the Northern Arizona site called Ridge Ruin. The man, bedecked in fine turquoise jewelry and intricate bead work, was surrounded by wooden swords with handles carved into animal hooves and human hands. The Hopi workers stepped back from the grave, knowing what the Moochiwimi sticks meant. This man, buried nine hundred years earlier, was a magician.
Former television journalist Kate Butler hangs on to her investigative reporting career by writing freelance magazine articles. Her research on The Magician shows he bore some European facial characteristics and physical qualities that made him different from the people who buried him. Her quest to discover The Magician’s origin carries her back to a time when the high desert world was shattered by the birth of a volcano and into the present-day dangers of archeological looting where black market sales of antiquities can lead to murder.
Former television journalist Kate Butler hangs on to her investigative reporting career by writing freelance magazine articles. Her research on The Magician shows he bore some European facial characteristics and physical qualities that made him different from the people who buried him. Her quest to discover The Magician’s origin carries her back to a time when the high desert world was shattered by the birth of a volcano and into the present-day dangers of archaeological looting where black market sales of antiquities can lead to murder.
has worked as a television sportscaster, newspaper and magazine writer, teacher, amateur baseball umpire, and high school football referee. She worked at WRBL‐TV in Columbus, Georgia, WROC‐TV in Rochester, New York, KTSP‐TV in Phoenix, Arizona, ESPN in Bristol, Connecticut, where she anchored the Emmy and ACE award‐winning SportsCenter, and ASPN-TV as the studio host for the NBA’s Phoenix Suns. Montgomery has been a freelance and staff writer for six publications, writing sports, features, movie reviews, and archeological pieces.
When she can, Anne indulges in her passions: rock collecting, scuba diving, football refereeing, and playing her guitar.
Learn more about
Anne Montgomery on her
website and
Wikipedia. Stay connected on
Facebook,
Linkedin, and
Twitter.
Next came choosing the new paint color. I wanted to go with a dark brown—mostly to hide all the flaws in the trunk’s body caused by my scraper. Perhaps I used little too much elbow grease. Hubby helped me with this part, carefully spraying the sides, allowing the trunk time to dry, then giving it another coat. Covering the flaws reminded me of the care a writer takes in creating characters. Like the gouges and grooves in my trunk, your characters NEED flaws because readers must feel some sort of connection with them. Readers WANT to cheer on those flawed underdogs, see them scream, watch them change and grow. And when that connection happens, they wholeheartedly invest in your characters and the hell authors drag them through.
