(no subject)
In my profession, in my line of lovely work, I get looked at a lot. I'm talking not only Tour Guidism, but Treading The Boards as well. I am used to being looked at. I thrive on being looked at. I dodged the camwhore bullet by the narrowest of narrow margins.
I obsess over every wrinkle, every blemish, every out-of-place hair. I see how the lines of my face are starting to deepen and I panic. Even now, after five years of not having a headshot, I still leap to the automatic conclusion that I need a new one because I've lost or gained a pound. I see how my cheekbones are better defined than they were when I was twenty-three, as the adolescent fatty padding has finally vanished. I stare at the small line between my eyebrows and start to understand what all the Botox fuss is all about, because I want that GONE. I inspect my face carefully every day, obsessively cleaning it with astringents and scrubs and soaps and still I get breakouts. Thirty-fucking-two years old, and I have zits.
Wrinkles and zits. Great combo. Oh, and occasional grey hairs, too! Marvelous. It's like somebody upstairs got my internal clock wrong and just threw their hands up and said, "Fuck it! Good enough." I can't go out in public without making sure I have make-up on. I don't want to subject people to this face without it. It's not pretty.
I always feel eyes on me. No, this is not some paranoid "OH GOD THEY'RE WATCHING ME" bullshit. I'm just very conscious of being looked at, even in a passing glance. The eyes of the people, the eye of a camera, the eyes of an audience, the eyes on a tram. I am conscious of them all. No, not to the point of "I always know when I'm being watched," but when I am aware of it, baby, I'm aware.
And sometimes, instead of thriving on it, it makes me supremely uncomfortable.
When I feel those stares, I want to know what the brains behind the eyes are thinking. I want to know what they see. Are they looking at my blonde hair? Are they staring at my breasts? Are they thinking about my skin? Are they wondering where I got my glasses or my boots? Am I a person to them, or just a bag of water and meat that makes pleasant noises? Are they judging me? Do they like what they see? Do they want to shake my hand, punch me, fuck me, kill me? Do they want to talk to me and see if my brain works like theirs? Do they even care, is my body just something to distract them from just staring at the concrete or a pigeon or the sky?
What do they see, when they're staring at me from the back row of the first car? From the front row of a theater? From across a 7-11 parking lot as I walk inside to get my Monster and smokes? Am I really so unusual that they need to memorize me as I spout my script, say my words, light up a Camel? I have the usual count of body parts, all arranged in their usual order.
Sometimes I want to snap, "Stop staring at me!" I want to put as much scorn into it as possible. I want them to be startled, I want to see their eyes go wide and their jaws go slack and their heads dart backwards involuntarily. I want to stare right back at them, challenge them, make them as conscious of this feeling as I am. But instead, I let my own gaze slide away, deliberately avoiding their looks. I stick my hands in my pockets and keep walking. I turn and get back in the moment of the scene and react. I look at the Bates Motel. I look away.
Stop staring at me.
I obsess over every wrinkle, every blemish, every out-of-place hair. I see how the lines of my face are starting to deepen and I panic. Even now, after five years of not having a headshot, I still leap to the automatic conclusion that I need a new one because I've lost or gained a pound. I see how my cheekbones are better defined than they were when I was twenty-three, as the adolescent fatty padding has finally vanished. I stare at the small line between my eyebrows and start to understand what all the Botox fuss is all about, because I want that GONE. I inspect my face carefully every day, obsessively cleaning it with astringents and scrubs and soaps and still I get breakouts. Thirty-fucking-two years old, and I have zits.
Wrinkles and zits. Great combo. Oh, and occasional grey hairs, too! Marvelous. It's like somebody upstairs got my internal clock wrong and just threw their hands up and said, "Fuck it! Good enough." I can't go out in public without making sure I have make-up on. I don't want to subject people to this face without it. It's not pretty.
I always feel eyes on me. No, this is not some paranoid "OH GOD THEY'RE WATCHING ME" bullshit. I'm just very conscious of being looked at, even in a passing glance. The eyes of the people, the eye of a camera, the eyes of an audience, the eyes on a tram. I am conscious of them all. No, not to the point of "I always know when I'm being watched," but when I am aware of it, baby, I'm aware.
And sometimes, instead of thriving on it, it makes me supremely uncomfortable.
When I feel those stares, I want to know what the brains behind the eyes are thinking. I want to know what they see. Are they looking at my blonde hair? Are they staring at my breasts? Are they thinking about my skin? Are they wondering where I got my glasses or my boots? Am I a person to them, or just a bag of water and meat that makes pleasant noises? Are they judging me? Do they like what they see? Do they want to shake my hand, punch me, fuck me, kill me? Do they want to talk to me and see if my brain works like theirs? Do they even care, is my body just something to distract them from just staring at the concrete or a pigeon or the sky?
What do they see, when they're staring at me from the back row of the first car? From the front row of a theater? From across a 7-11 parking lot as I walk inside to get my Monster and smokes? Am I really so unusual that they need to memorize me as I spout my script, say my words, light up a Camel? I have the usual count of body parts, all arranged in their usual order.
Sometimes I want to snap, "Stop staring at me!" I want to put as much scorn into it as possible. I want them to be startled, I want to see their eyes go wide and their jaws go slack and their heads dart backwards involuntarily. I want to stare right back at them, challenge them, make them as conscious of this feeling as I am. But instead, I let my own gaze slide away, deliberately avoiding their looks. I stick my hands in my pockets and keep walking. I turn and get back in the moment of the scene and react. I look at the Bates Motel. I look away.
Stop staring at me.