Shocking Stories About Your Golden Era Relatives

[Monsoon]

My mother's family was old Ontario stock, salt of the earth, temperance, church goers etc. But she had a couple of aunts about which, the less said the better.

Every family has them.

Yep, and it's people like that who make family reunions fun and entertaining!

 

[LizzieMaine]

Speaking for myself, I only worry about my weight when my clothes start to get too tight. I don't have time to sew up a whole new wardrobe. I know too many women my age who are gaunt, hollow-eyed joyless stick-insect wraiths because they live on green liquid sludge and a handful of kale.

 

[Harp]

Most of the waitresses I've known have been extraordinarily smart. They might not be able to conjugate Latin verbs, but when it comes to the challenges of daily life, they know the score better than just about anyone.

Cecidi. And I have fallen more than once for a waitress.

 

[sheeplady]

My completely anecdotal observation is that women eat healthier than men (in general, there are always exceptions) and women encourage their spouses to eat healthier.

To be honest, most of the ladies I know do not eat that healthy. They tend to eat things with less calories, but it is not with an eye for nutrition. I know plenty of gals who live off lean cuisine and eat salads out because they are less calories; not because they want to be healthy. Now, we could get into a whole argument about if lean cuisine is healthier than burgers and fries; but I don't think we can argue that the first isn't less calories. A woman will go for the low-fat chips and the diet soda for a snack because of calories; not because they are superior nutrition. It just happens that some lower calorie food is better for you than higher calorie food- an apple is a more nutritious snack than a candy bar.

There's significant evidence that couples "average" once they move in with each other and this includes weight. Women will sometimes gain a little and men lose a little because both halves of the couple pick up habits; but I am not convinced that marriage dramatically changes the habits of a single person in the marriage.

 

[Shangas]

I have to concur with your observations, though in my experience women tend to eat healthier foods in an attempt to maintain their figures more so than their health.

I agree with this and the other post, as well. That said, I do try and lose weight and maintain a healthy diet and such for as long as it's practical to do so.

 

[AdeeC]

An old joke I heard. Why do men usually die before their wives?
.....Because they want to!

 

[Fading Fast]

Speaking for myself, I only worry about my weight when my clothes start to get too tight. I don't have time to sew up a whole new wardrobe. I know too many women my age who are gaunt, hollow-eyed joyless stick-insect wraiths because they live on green liquid sludge and a handful of kale.

In NYC, what my girlfriend and I notice is the what we call the "plastic surgery women." These women have had so many face lifts and botox injections (or whatever it is they do today), that their faces look frozen - they don't move, they have less wrinkles, but it all looks weird and fake. They also all start to look alike. You can even see this in some of our movie stars where they kind of look "younger" than their age - less wrinkles - but they don't look good, just frozen (and their mouths get a Joker from Batman shape).

We live in one of the least expensive neighborhoods in the city, but it is only a few blocks from one of the most expensive (the logic and nuances on NYC real-estate are crazy), so we see these very wealthy women frozen in time everywhere (they come over to our neighborhood to shop on the cheap for the essentials that don't have labels). I believe in freedom, which includes the freedom to spend your money on plastic surgery - my only point is that I don't think they are buying anything but a weird frozen face.

To slightly tie his back to the thread. My grandmother was very neat and took pride in her appearance, but even if she could have afforded it, I can't image her ever considering plastic surgery to look younger. That said, and here's another very tiny skeleton, I remember when I was young, a distant cousin had a nose job in the '60s and it was a sotto voce scandal in the family amongst the older relatives. To give you an idea of how old I was at the time, I remember wanting to see her so I could see what I thought would literally be her plastic nose.

 

[HoosierDaddy]

'Joker mouth'..what a great description. To get a good look at that just stop on one of the "Housewife' reality shows for a moment. Most all of those socialites have that very noticeable same appearance. Crazy
HD

 

[DecoDame]

This


Or This, basically. I know which I'll choose.



I'm not setting up Ms. Novak or anyone else for abuse or mocking, and trust no one else here will either. Whatever forces in our culture and our own minds that makes we women think it's preferable to look unrecognizable rather than just be our human selves, confounds me and makes me terribly, terribly sad. I have a lot of compassion for the latter ladies. It must be very painful for them.

 

[Fading Fast]

DD, I agree. I think it is very hard for some women, with all our societal pressure, to age. Living in this crazy city, I have known several models over the years and, in their prime, they orbit a different sun than us mere mortals.

What I mean by that is that it is incredible the way both men and women treat women of model-level beauty. In almost every store, they will get unbelievable service and quite often be offered free things. Doors do literal open for them (people fight to do it for them), they are invited to incredible events and are taken to incredible places - and here is the thing - all of this is offered to them by people not trying got date them.

Yes, I've seen it, women and men (not trying to date them) will still move heaven and earth to be near these women or have them in their world in some way or to do something nice for them simply for a smile in return. They are constant offered jobs: I had a model girlfriend who was offered several high-paying jobs that she had no experience for and the boss to be said she'd be trained after she was hired - and again, I'm not talking something untoward - they were sales / promotional roles where a beautiful women will get orders and entry easily to things that others have to work long and hard for.

And now we turn to what we all know - that men hit on them constantly and in incredible ways. They are showered with gifts, invitations, etc., that are over the top.

And, then, it slows down, not all at once, but over time: A door doesn't magically open, a counter man is rude, a man doesn't call back and on and on. It takes an incredibly well-grounded person to handle that shift without trying to do something to get it back. I've known some who handle it very well as they understood all along it was a fleeting gift and I've known some who never adjusted and are angry and bitter.

Okay, even though that's for the .00001% of the population that is at the model level, I agree with you: I think many women feel that pressure. I don't feel anything but sadness at all the plastic surgery I see in this city as it seems so heartbreaking and counter productive. Age naturally, take the best care of yourself that you can and be positive - those tend to be the people I find most beautiful.

And many years later, when at a family funeral, I finally saw the distant relative who had the nose job, her nose looked small and out of proportion to her face. Seemed weird.

But one final point - I do understand that some people have some features that are - to them - very disturbing and if that is the case, and something can be done to help them feel better about themselves - that makes sense to me.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I'm in the process of reading a book by sociologist David L. Cohn called "Love in America," published in 1943. He has a lot to say about the images of beauty being promulgated by Hollywood at that time, and none of it is positive. He could see the corrosive influence of airbrushed, gauze-lensed perfection on the women of his own day:

In many cases, it seems to me, our national ideal of physical beauty in women is sophomoric; skin-deep; and as flat as the screen on which the models of beauty are projected. Often indeed it is decadent. Many of our allegedly beautiful women, as pictured in fashion magazines, seem not only unbeautiful but physically and spiritually sick. These gaunt faces, these hard, unseeing eyes, these flat figures, and over all a tough, smooth patina as though they had been dipped in lacquer and so preserved, cold, nerveless and rigid through time..."

-- page 180

Cohn saw all this seventy-two years ago. We, as women, are constantly being told that we've made vast strides since then. And yet every word Cohn wrote is obscenely true today. "We've come so far."

 

[sheeplady]

I think the pressure on women to change themselves just to standards of beauty is sad when it becomes an addition. I think when it is used against natural aging time and time again it is particularly sad for the people who are doing it. It is an honor to grow old, an honor some of us may sadly not get.

However, having had breast cancer, my position on cosmetic surgery has changed a lot. I've met a lot of women who have had mastectomies and reconstruction. This is basically a cosmetic surgery. It's unnecessary when it comes to "function" because besides breast feeding, a woman's breasts serve little practical purpose; and that function cannot be regained by reconstruction. There are a number of adaptive breasts on the market (nicknamed falsies) that women can wear, including those you can wear swimming. There are also many products for women who choose to have mastectomies without reconstruction and not wear falsies, including adaptive bathing suits, etc.

The women who choose to have reconstruction are doing it purely for cosmetic reasons. I know, because when I was faced with the possibility of having a mastectomy, I pushed for me having immediate reconstruction. (I did not have a mastectomy, I had a lumpectomy, so I was able to keep my breasts.) I wanted my breasts; and ******, if I couldn't have the god-given ones I was going to get awesome fake ones. (And I mean awesome.) It was *entirely* motivated by cosmetics- to wear the clothes I wanted to wear, to wear a swimsuit without worrying about my falsies falling out, to still be attractive to my husband. (My husband didn't care; I cared.) It was entirely cosmetics, full stop.

I cannot judge any woman with breast cancer or any person with cancer who wants anything. Cancer takes enough, and it is tragic when it leaves physical scars; moreso when it takes your body parts.

How it has changed my perspectives on cosmetic surgery is this: I used to differentiate between plastic surgery between "cosmetic reasons" and "necessary reasons." So, for instance, cosmestic surgery to look younger I thought was in bad taste, but things like reconstruction and surgery after accidents to make a person "normal" was different. Then I was number one to line up for a purely cosmetic surgery; a surgery I knew had life-long dangers simply because I didn't want to look bad in a dress or roll over in the bed and feel nothing on my chest.

It's not in my power to judge harshly women who go under the knife when I was so ready to do so myself. You can blab on about how it's different- I had CANCER and all that- but it isn't a bit different in my mind. It was sad for me to so desperately want to look good, to look like what I thought was normal, but I did.

 

[2jakes]

I worked for many years as a news photog. where the emphasis was on youth &
beauty for the women (reporters) that accompanied me everyday on stories.
I recall one making a comment, " Oh J... I'm getting old ( she was in her 40s & quite a stunner).

Reading earlier here about how some women are in a certain category that everything is offered
to them because of their looks. And when they see the first wrinkle..some have chosen to do
whatever it takes to contain that which they receive everyday from others but feel they are losing
it as they get older.
btw; I believe I told her how lucky she was to be healthy & that she was mellowing like fine wine
or something like that which I meant as a compliment because she was & is a beautiful person &
not just on her looks but her inner spirit. I would hope her husband would tell her the same...
she smiled & sincerely said "Thanks...J... I needed to hear that."

just my 2¢...

 

[Hat Dandy]

How it has changed my perspectives on cosmetic surgery is this: I used to differentiate between plastic surgery between "cosmetic reasons" and "necessary reasons." So, for instance, cosmestic surgery to look younger I thought was in bad taste, but things like reconstruction and surgery after accidents to make a person "normal" was different.

I think you've hit upon a worthy distinction. Getting surgery done for mere vanity is distinct from restoring someone to normalcy. A person obtaining facial reconstruction surgery after an accident wouldn't be merely appealing to superficial inclinations. In your case, I would posit that you are yearning to return to "normal" and not to attain some insipid ideal of beauty.

 

[Fading Fast]

Since we've gone there, I'll complete the last thought from my prior post. I think plastic surgery is a continuum. I doubt too many people think it is wrong, as Hat Dandy said, to have reconstructive facial surgery after a disfiguring accident nor for the reasons that Sheeplady stated. I certainly don't. I also don't think it is wrong if you really hate something about your face that surgery can make you feel better and more confident - then go for it. I don't even think it is wrong if you - man or women - want to nip and tuck to stay a bit younger - not my thing, but go for it. If done for a positive reason in a healthy context and it really helps you - then good for you.

The thing that I think is sad is when it appears to become an addiction and the results are freaky. At that point, the good, confidence-enhancing part is over and that is unfortunate for the person. It is why seeing all the older women in my neighborhood with their frozen faces and joker mouths depresses me - I don't care that they wanted to look younger, that's their call, but that they lost all sight of reality in some crazy quest to look young forever, that is sad.

It's all a continuum. From coloring your hair, to wearing makeup to men who do something to improve their hairline to plastic surgery - it's all about wanting to look better. It can be for a healthy and reasonable or insane or crazy reason. From a freedom perspective, do what you want, I just feel bad for those who it appears have lost perspective.

And in thinking about Lizzie post, I agree but would emphasize, many, many women and men don't play that game - the what "Hollywood or the Boys from Marketing" says you should look like. I don't, my girlfriend doesn't and most (all) of our friends don't. Do we care about our appearance - yes. Do we stay in shape, eat healthy (most of the time), etc., - yes, but in a normal way not a I have to look like so and so way. So I see all the Hollywood stuff (most of the young women stars look like they never eat) and feel badly for them, but believe that large parts of our society get that, that is a crazy world and ignore it.

 

[DecoDame]

^^^ +1

Yes, it’s that compulsive need where the goal post of “perfection” is and always will be out of reach and they no longer look like a “better” version of themselves, they don’t even look like themselves at all, which saddens me. I feel at that point, that no competent, ethical surgeon should take them on, no matter how much money is thrown at them. It’s the extremes of that continuum and a total denial of what stage of life they inhabit. My assumption is that they feel that door-opening currency that beauty gave them is all they have and they have to shore it up beyond reason. That’s such a waste, in my opinion.

But I don’t feel all surgery is verboten – especially since I had surgery myself in my early 20s to straighten a broken nose. It wasn’t inhibiting my breathing or anything. I just didn’t want to look like a boxer anymore (actually, I caught a baseball with my face as a young girl) and I came into some money and thought “Hell, yeah”. On the other hand, I have a fairly prominent nose and I didn’t go into some reduction spiral and get a #345 Button Nose (copyright pending) while I was under, either. It wouldn’t look like me anymore and would throw the scale of my whole face off. And I wouldn’t look related to any of my crazy family anymore. So. There’s definitely a relativity involved. I just wonder when they seem to be inflicting injury on themselves, rather than helping themselves.

Edited to add: I'm glad to hear that FF knows plenty who are successfully swimming against the stream of our marketed beauty culture - but it is also undeniably a strong current, and one that can affect young girls especially. I guess I don't run into as many who have escaped that trap to feel so confident about it though. I think its influence is deep and far reaching and really hard to shake off or ignore. Hats off to anyone who can take it or leave it or indulge in moderation. Because my experience as a woman, is that it's pretty insidious and it affects you in ways you aren't even aware of.

 

[Fading Fast]

DD, to be sure I didn't misrepresent, are my friend and I influenced by current culture and the obsessive youth / skinny / workout culture - to some degree, absolutely. But most of us seem to understand that it is silliness - a crazy drive for a ridiculous goal. So we fight it and laugh about it and, in general, seem to be reasonably comfortable with our not-perfect selves.

I didn't want to portray myself or my girlfriend and our friends as above it all - we aren't, but we do seem to get that the Hollywood / culture thing is silly / stupid and we push against it. And maybe it helps that we are all in our mid 40s to mid 50s - life has given us some perspective.

Will my 5'11" 135lb girlfriend look at some Hollywood skinny thing and say, "I'm a house" on an off day - sure, but then I'll look at her with a "really?" look on my face and she'll laugh. We don't have the answers, but we know that Hollywood and all that are not the real world.

 

[LizzieMaine]

If 5' 11"/ 135 counts as a house these days, at 5'6"/170 I must be a whole subdivision.

 

[tonyb]

To the best of my knowledge, not a one of my people who were drawing breath during the first half of the last century ever once had cosmetic surgery. Not that they wouldn't have benefitted from it.

 

[Zombie_61]

I think you've hit upon a worthy distinction. Getting surgery done for mere vanity is distinct from restoring someone to normalcy. A person obtaining facial reconstruction surgery after an accident wouldn't be merely appealing to superficial inclinations. In your case, I would posit that you are yearning to return to "normal" and not to attain some insipid ideal of beauty.

I absolutely agree with this. If a person has been "disfigured" in some way because of, say, physical trauma such as an automobile accident, or as a result of treatment for a medical condition such as a mastectomy, then it's perfectly reasonable for that person to want to have their appearance returned to the way it was before that event. It's also reasonable if "cosmetic" surgery is performed for medical reasons - a woman having breast reduction surgery to alleviate back problems, for example. But if a person is having a risky medical procedure performed simply because they think their nose is too big, or their jawline isn't masculine enough, or for any other purely cosmetic reasons, I sincerely believe their "issues" run deeper and that a plastic surgeon isn't the solution. Yes, mental and emotional health are important but, generally speaking, those don't fall under a plastic surgeon's purview.