I had cataract surgery on Monday--successful, easy, painless. But here's the thing no one tells you about cataract surgery. If, like me, you wait until the cataract is huge and dense you come away from the surgery with a brand-new view of the world -- which everyone said was going to be so great. But things that were fuzzy and rosy-looking before (my face, for example) are now alarmingly unfuzzy when I look in the mirror. Now I see someone with many wrinkles, hairs in places they shouldn't be, huge pores, and a lot of gray in her hair. I've apparently been walking around on this planet thinking I looked one way only to learn that, no, I didn't look like that.
It's weird to age 10 years in one day. So what have I learned about myself? Well, I'm way more vain than I ever knew. And way older. It took me a day or two to realize that I look the same to everyone else; I'm the only one who had the shock of seeing myself as I truly am.
So I ordered a big supply of these powder papers -- I'd rather look like an old lady wearing a tad too much powder than an old lady who has given up caring how she looks.
Ordering the papers triggered a lovely memory however. I'm fairly sure that I first bought this item about 20 years ago on one of my fun day-trips to New York City with a good friend. She introduced me to Zitomer Pharmacy, a family-owned, independent drug store on the upper East Side with aisles packed with ladies stuff. Looking at pictures of it now, it seems very high-end, but 20 years ago it just seemed quirky.
