A China Doll Breaks

4.8.07
A China Doll Breaks
I have always thought it would be fun. But with anything I always think… I am often wrong… or at least disappointed. Yesterday was no different. I let half of the women in China dress me up like a china doll… which is bizarre… Chinese dressing up an American to look like a Chinese dressed as an American. If you followed that… then you are ahead of me. I agreed, and well honestly wanted to have my picture taken Chinese-style. Which as I have come to know, means six hours of hair, make-up and costumes; contortionist postures and livid smiles showing all of my gleaming white teeth, including the ones in the back; and an emotional rollercoaster that would match the world’s fair.
The morning started in confusion as many mornings do. Then a scurry to the studio as to not be late for an appointment we do not have, accompanied by always, one too many people. We get there and as a result of our hurry we have to wait. I am behind a blushing (yet miserable looking) bride, whose make-up will take even longer than mine. God help her. So long that we have to come back in the afternoon.
So we do, after enough noodles to feed an army, a nap to wake the dead and an ice cream. Accompanied my a legion of women, aging Chinese women with not a word of English among them, we walk the bock and a half to the studio where I begin my transformation immediately. First, the complexion. Then the hair and the colors, the eyes, the cheeks, the lips and the… well anything hey can find to put makeup in they will. And then they set in on the hair with a furry of curling irons and hairspray.
I emerge with a mask of whiteness that even I can’t recognize, eyes to seduce a maharaja …….and a helmet of curls I could go into battle with. I do. I go into battle. I lose. I fight. The battle is fought for me. I give up and then I win. A battle of heart. A battle of spirit and a battle of image are fought and one… in a studio. The image that is sold is far from what the eye sees. Both mine and that of the beholder. I am the product and the consumer… I am the consumer of the product that is me.
Half way there I lost my nerve the battle of beauty had bested me and I was ready to through in the towel and all the tattered dresses that were too small for me with it. I was ready to call it a day… a valiant effort… and not much lost in the process except pride and self-worth. All in all it could have been worse, maybe if the third world war started… in this particular village in China. But at that point I would not have noticed even bombs falling around me, unless they could destroy the feeling… inside. The total loss of faith. In self. The loss of faith in self… and the way that I see me. Maybe I gave up long ago, before I walked in. before I grew up before I grew old… maybe I gave up long ago. But I felt like the battle was lost in that moment. A battle that has laid dormant. Dormant for years. A battle I could not even see or care to know before this very day. A battle that was lost somewhere between birth and adolescence. It was a battle of self. Of womanhood and of image. Of beauty and of perception. A battle lost and fought a million times by every living creature throughout history and time. A battle fought by ourselves, amongst ourselves, with ourselves. But it wasn’t until this battle with this self on this day that I noticed.
I had hit bottom… and again slowly climb back from there for where else is there to go from there? Somewhere in the wreckage and the desolation. The despair and the numbness of pain was the start of something… the sprout of something. It was the birth of another beauty, another image another battle.. Yet to be had, yet to be envisioned, but destined all the same. But what is it worth… this life, if there is not a battle raging somewhere over something? If it is not being fought for then is it worth anything at all?
So in a ball gown I began again. The beauty routine. Pinned in all the right places, makeup touched up and hair teased into compliance. I battled the fear of self and the fear of fear. With a Chinese fan in one hand and an umbrella in the other I went to war. Parasol and fan. The weapons of the ages. The weapons of the sexes. Maybe even the weapons of sex. Being a woman I am surely not looking comfortable when I wasn’t and being happy when I wasn’t sure that I was. That was the battle… more with myself than with anything or anyone else. But a battle all the same. Sometimes I think I am the only worthy adversary.
And before I had even noticed there was something else happening. I had an idea. I turned to my friend in a swarm of people. Hoping that they knew as little English as they let on. And I asked her to keep my secret. “ I want you to ask that man to have dinner with me tomorrow night.” I said. But keep it a secret. “No one can know.” I don’t know why I thought there was any sense of modesty or privacy left in my life, but old habits die hard I suppose. And so she had my secret. Within a moment I knew there was no such thing as a secret in China. She returned to my side. “ I have told my mother,” she said. “She will ask him for you, my dear.” although it is not exactly how I imagined it. This was much more like ancient China than middle school and I guess that is a step in the right direction. Without knowing the answer for several hours I wandered through the routine of dresses, makeup and hair. Pose. Smile. Tilt your head this way. Look that way. Hold it. Again. Smile. Very good. Smile. Smile. Smile.
With my keen wit and much patience I gathered that my offer had been accepted and that the news had spread like wildfire through the studio and probably the town. There is no such thing as a secret in China… certainly not in a beauty parlor. I should have known better. I can her gossip a mile away even in Chinese. It sounds exactly the same.
…
Who knew a day could be such a ride… and that at the end of such misery… I would have a date and maybe even a crush. For 80 RBM, about $12 I had an afternoon that would go previously unmatched. Hopefully next time I spend $12 it will not be so exhausting.