Craving pink

A young ( by my standards please!!) woman journalist who I met through another journalist, who I know as one of my father's close friend's son, rang me up the other day.

She is currently doing a column on beauty in a weekly, and wanted to know what kind of stuff I might like to read?

Well, faced with that question, my immediate response was- nothing.

I really don't care to read your beauty column at all.

I have carried this chip on my shoulder about inner beauty being the important thing- for a substantial part of my life. Long enough to have wasted some considerable time pretending "looks don't matter" .

And then I remembered this quiz I have taken on Face Book. It says, and this is something that many people, including my long suffering family members, have pointed out ever so often; that I come across as an aggressive person. The quiz adds that I am "not really mean" implying as it were, that I come across that way as well.

But I like M, and she was telling me she respects my opinion.

So I tried to deal with the impulse to speak my whole truth- the impulsive kind. The one about Beauty Columns being a waste of time.

But M is a good journalist I think- tenacious. Only she is young, and which young adult would like to acknowledge that? I have more than a sneaking suspicion she does not want to do this beauty column- would prefer to do more "worthwhile stuff". (Which means it has to be ugly and about the majority of Indians- the poor.) It might not be easy for her either. I bet some people - friends and family- have been pulling her leg. From what she was doing (being the flag/torch bearer) to doing a beauty column could be a come down.

Maybe I could and should extend this conversation a bit, deal with my own initial aggressive response, and check out what she was doing.

I pointed out to her that we had met. Was it not obvious, from the way I presented myself, that inner beauty is what matters to me- and I really am not one of the consumers of beauty products.

Oh dear, I could see that this was part of the game playing- the one I engage in with that particular chip on my shoulder.

As I dealt with that on a side lane in my head, I could acknowledge gradually that actually I do read stuff which is not necessarily meaningful, by being about sad difficult matters.

I do love to read the page 3 kind of stuff too. And I jolly well enjoy it as much as I care to read about the terrible things that are happening in Chhattisgarh. I like the idea of looking exciting as much ( well, almost as much) as I want to ensure some effective action is being taken to rectify a bad situation there.

But what I enjoy most of all is the romance in both. Well maybe in everything.

Whatever the issue, the wrapping has to be romantic for me to be interested.

Facts are useful, and my actions may be determined on the basis of reality. But I would buy only romance- given a choice.

I love the earthy colours for sure, but maybe , just maybe I have longed to be pink.

M has promised to send me a copy of what she does this week.