CityView Magazine

CityViewNC.com | 23 W H AT ' S YO U R F LO O R S T Y L E? A Shaw Flooring Gallery 910.485.5865 | 2825 RAEFORD ROAD | WWW.WEBBCARPET.NET CA R PE T | CE R A MI C | H A R D WO O D | L A MI N ATE Since 1965 Webb Carpet Company Celebrating 55 Years Celebrating 55 Years FTCC Corporate & Continuing Education Offering something for everyone! f www.faytechcc.edu/continuing-education ADULT HIGH SCHOOL CAREER TRAINING HEALTHCARE PROGRAMS INDUSTRY TRAINING SMALL BUSINESS SUMMERSCAPES FOR KIDS TRANSITION TECH Questions? Call (910) 678-8432 Apparently, the folks who formulate these lotions and potions have been quite busy over the past 25 years that I've been using the same trusty Oil of Olay Original Beauty Fluid that suddenly ain't doing the trick anymore. I stood agape in the aisle of our local beauty store, faced with shelves upon shelves of bottles and jars of all sorts. What type of skin do I have? Oily? Dry? Combination? Heck, I don't know! I'd say sort of pale, kind of wrinkly and a lot freckly. Rapid-repair, triple-firming, or micro-sculpting? Is "all of the above" not an option? Pineapple enzymes, shea butter, avocado oil? Ok, now I'm hungry. Cream, serum or gel? Does it come in magic elixir? Daytime formula or nighttime? Ha! I see through your subtle marketing ploy to get the suckers to buy both! (Adds to basket, adds to basket) What's a retinoid? I could have sworn it was something from Star Wars. Peptide. Ceramide. Hyaluronic acid. Why am I having flashbacks to barely passing college chemistry in the aisle of Ulta? irty minutes and over 100 bucks later, I le the store with a bag full of promises. Surely I'd have firm, youthful, glowing, toxin-free skin in no time. Over the past months since my purchases, I've learned from experience precisely how those anti-aging products work. ey slowly burn and peel your skin until you're basically le with nothing but a shiny, wrinkle-free skull. Mission accomplished. Vanity and self-deprecation aside, when I really reflect on my 35(.71) trips around the sun, I am grateful. Grateful for the childhood family vacation weeks spent riding waves and hunting crabs in the sunshine at Sunset Beach, the source of most of those fine lines around my eyes. Grateful that my now achy knees once allowed me to run miles and miles all over Fayetteville as a teenager during a time before the distraction of smartphones and when no one really thought twice about a young woman jogging alone outdoors. And grateful for two healthy pregnancies that, while, yes, brought along the stubborn bulging veins in my legs, also produced our beautiful children. I wish I could go back and do it all again, in exactly the same way. I might just wear a little more sunscreen. Claire Mullen can be reached at clairejlmullen@gmail.com.

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