I am a sucker for everything I read about on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram. I believe in quick fixes, weight loss with no pain or effort, erasing years of sun damage from my face with special lotions, and rolling away the cellulite on my thighs with the latest invention. By the time the item arrives in the mail, I realize it will not be ‘life transforming,’ but instead, it just had a good marketing pitch. I even buy the stuff the sharks reject on Shark Tank thinking those experts might be wrong. I’d like to think that at least it’s good for the economy, but I suspect there are exactly 10 inventors who come up with these lotions, gadgets and appetite suppressants and they just repackage them every so often. That said, I really did believe an Instagram post for a book called Lazy Perfection: The Art of Looking Great Without Really Trying. And no, it didn’t occur to me why it would take the length of an actual book to figure it out.
I am a reader. I consider it my only legitimate hobby since reading gossip websites is my other one, but you can’t admit that while trying to impress people at a cocktail party. I write the reviews you read in Town&Style. You might have never noticed these reviews, but I take them very seriously. I used to have a rule that if I started a book, I had to finish it. But a few years ago, I realized Sr. Catherine Patricia was no longer keeping track, so I didn’t need to finish a book to get a gold star.
When Lazy Perfection arrived, I already felt bad about myself. You see, the cover of a book really sets the tone, and there it was: the most perfect drawing of a person in a white T-shirt and jeans, hair casually tossed into a ponytail with just the right amount of makeup. I then looked at the back page and got a glimpse of the author. She was beautiful! So maybe that was the key. You could be lazy and look good when you already had the advantage of being beautiful. I hoped it was photoshopped. I started reading about moisturizers, sunscreens and cleansers, and then this acronym, TPW, started popping up. I wondered what it meant, but I was too far into figuring out if my eyes were round, almond, wide-set, upturned or hooded to care. (Mine, sadly, are hooded due to age. That’s the bad news. Good news? The book says don’t waste my time on detailed eye shadow because no one can see it anyway!)
When the book suggested I stop wearing Chapstick as lipstick, I realized TPW stood for The Perfect Woman. What?! How had this happened? I was 135 pages into this book before I realized I was striving to be the perfect woman. First, I knew I wouldn’t do anything that already had been suggested in the first 134 pages because I am too lazy to head to Sephora or Ulta to buy the right products. Second, there are no perfect women or men. Everyone has something. It’s life. So I shut the book never to find out the color of my eyebrows given my hair color, but knowing I am just fine being lazy and not trying. Oh, and very far from perfect. Email me if you want to give lazy perfection a shot, and I’ll give you the book without judgement.
Contact Patty at phannum@townandstyle.com.