Boot Dish Syndicate Dude Week: Guest Blogger Flat
Flat writes for The Compleat Flat and lives in the same state in which I was born. We have a lot of strange things in common!
Good Theme Song:
Frank Zappa
"Lonesome Cowboy Burt"
200 Motels
1971
Dear Readers of Birdie,
Shortly after the inauguration of JFK in 1961 my eighth grade buddies and I wrote a skit about the Kennedy's for our annual church variety show. What with no females in the group and my dark hair and olive skin, it fell to me to play the part of Jackie O. (What the heck, Milton Berle played females all the time on TV right?)
So I did the skit replete in dress, wig, hat, and heavy makeup. I distinctly remember one of the funniest lines in the skit is when Jackie told Jack that the 3 million dollars she needed last month in the household budget was for lipstick and makeup alone. The skit was the hit of the evening and spoke to the 'beauty' of our new First Lady?
Now when Birdie invited me to write a guest blog for her website, two things happened: 1) my stomach knotted up a little cause Birdie's readers are used to readin' somethin' worth readin', and 2) the only 'beauty topic' memories of note in my life are the story above and the story below.
Years later I joined the repertory company of our small college and took up the study of all things acting including the art of applyin' stage makeup. Now in those days there were a lot of fledgling actors given to clownish makeup and they were almost all inexperienced female actors. Wait ladies! The reason I say that is because young male actors always understated their stage makeup. (Anybody not used to wearing makeup on a regular basis would probably make that same mistake?) The girls honestly thought they knew what they were doin' and almost always took it over the top!
In the meantime, with a lot of practice on myself and a few reluctant volunteers I got quite good in the art of stage makeup. And word got around.
To some the word fell on deaf ears, because the boys, to my knowledge, had no interest in me workin' on their faces. It was the girls who asked if I would 'teach' them the art of makeup for the stage. Oh joy! Oh joy! Oh freakin' Hallelujah!
Each night I would get to the theater long before anyone else. I would set out my wares and study them carefully for a long time before my first 'client' showed up.
And then we danced!
When you're twenty years old, and you're a male who likes girls, and you have the opportunity to spend some up-close time doing honest work on a female body, where no experience and no license is required, and there's no established time line to finish the work, you cross into that Nirvanic dream you've had so many times before - that sensual world of soft conversation, the smell of freshly washed skin, and the warmth of a body near your body at just the right distance - a perfect sort of oneness. And the best part of the deal? The focus of the task at hand keeps you from going totally and wildly insane and blowin' the whole thing!
Now I won't say that these little encounters were almost like sex; I'll just say that at the time they were sex to me. But they weren't better than real SEX, which I discovered about a year later. (Did I tell you all that I was raised Catholic?)
The results? When my 'students' looked in the mirror, they saw an actor ready to get into character and go to work. It was pretty amazing. In my experience, makeup really does have the ability to transform.
Alas readers, I am not twenty years old and don't care to be again. I have come to appreciate the appearance of an honestly gained wrinkle. Yep! A well earned wrinkle is as sexy to me now as a pert breast was to me back when. And I suspect that this one thought alone will probably disqualify me from ever fillin' in for Birdie again but I'm glad she gave me one chance anyway!
Sincerely,
Flatline
PS Now if a girl asked me today if I could help her hide any or all of her well earned wrinkles much as I like em, I believe I'd do in a minute!
PPS Birdie, when you get back could you send me a current catalogue on your girl products, just in case I might need em?
5:27:18 AM 
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