I should have seen the signs all those years ago when my daughter, then a wobbly toddler, found my lipstick. Though this seems to be the given right that they will always find your makeup bag, she didn’t just find my makeup bag but indeed my most prized lipstick. I had a Clarins lipstick in the most beautiful shade of red. Red not being an everyday colour for me it was tucked away for special occasions and until I was brave enough to wear it. When she was a toddler she had long blonde ringlets and natural skin colour that any sun worshipper would have been envious off. She got her always tanned look from her father as I am more the pale and interesting breed. Put all of that together with her big brown eyes and she was indeed rather cute. The found red lipstick was not plastered all over the wall or indeed anywhere else and I think I would probably have coped better if it was. Instead she had put it on her lips ‘just like grandma’. It was perfect. None of this clowns look or halfway up her cheek but indeed perfectly applied to her lips. The colour looked ridiculously perfect on her.
12 years on and nothing has changed. Jeans that I have long given up hope wearing again without inducing a hernia look effortlessly perfect on her. The little vest top look that struggles to hold it all together or indeed in on me is again perfect on her body given the fact everything on her isn’t trying to escape south ( or eat and west too). And just don’t get me started on jodhpurs.
And so the life of living with a teenage daughter is in full swing. By my maths I have 5 of the 7 teenage years left to endure. 5 more years of nothing of the girly nature of mine is being safe. 5 more years of practising being able to say she looks lovely without it showing on my face that indeed she does look perfect but makes me feel very old and past it. Wishing she wouldn’t skip down the path after a long day with such energy in front of me when I struggle to put one foot in front of the other after one supermarket shop.
The only saving fact in all this beauty and perkiness  is that I no longer think I am losing my marbles when I can’t find my moisturiser, shoes, top, necklace…….anything of mine. The fact is that there are no magic fairies that whisk these items away but in fact a teenager. If ever I lose anything in the house I now know it’s in most likely to be found in her room.
Don’t get me wrong her youth and beauty really is lovely to see and I am proud to say helped to create her. But it does bring home how much my own body has fast passing its sell by date.
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