I was idling in bed reading the news on my phone five minutes before my alarm went off, and the headline caught my eye. “How you do your makeup if you only have five minutes.” I sat up, intrigued. I had five minutes! Right this minute, in fact!
It took me five minutes to read through the article and find the bits about what makeup to put on in what order, so when my alarm went off, I was already behind. No matter; surely I could spare five minutes before my kids barrelled into my bedroom demanding waffles cooked just right. “Not burned, Mum! Not burned!”
The next five minutes were spent locating my makeup, which was in my wardrobe for some unknown reason. I had to rat through a basket of expired mascara and mostly empty lippies to find the items the routine recommended. It wanted me to use highlighting powder first. I don’t own any of that, so I thought I’d just use foundation. I patted it all over my face, then looked in the mirror and was horrified to see that I have somehow grown two shades paler than I was the last time I wore foundation. (Guess I need to get out in the sun more often? Or maybe just get new foundation.)
With the clock ticking and the newly awake baby starting to holler inquisitively from the direction of her cot, I looked at the next step. Eyeshadow! Except my eyeshadows have all been repurposed by my children as Holi Festival powders. (Holi is the Hindu festival of colours and in India, celebrants throw coloured powder on each other. My kids smeared each other with eyeshadow.) So that wasn’t going to happen. Nor were the contouring or bronzer, because whoops, I don’t own those either. I did find a face powder that I think I got as a sample at work, but it crumbled out of the palette when I opened it, so that was a bust.
The last step was lipstick. Yes! I have tonnes of lippies! They’re mostly empty, but I have myriad shades! I located one that was called, hopefully, “Passion Pink” and opened it up. What I saw was shocking. Shocking pink in colour, that is. But there wasn’t time to look for another one; the five minutes were up long ago. The baby was screaming. My son was yelling something about the waffles being burned again. “Waffles? Wait, I didn’t cook you any waffles! Did you put those waffles in the toaster yourself? Did you turn the dial to 1 because anything higher will burn the waffles! Argh! I’ll be right there!”
I swiped the lippy over my lips and turned to run out of the bathroom. Time elapsed: 15 minutes. Makeup used: Old foundation and too-bright lippy. Five minute makeup routine? Yeah, right.
Next time I’ll just skip it and go right for the waffles. Syrup makes your lips shiny, so it can double as lip gloss, right?
Katherine Granich
