“Did you see that woman on the cover of New York Magazine?”

            “What woman?”

            “Jocelyn Wildenstein.  You know, the one who had all that plastic surgery and looks like she dropped out of a space ship.”

            “Yeah.”

            “Well, I thought of you when I saw her picture.  I hope you don’t end up looking like that.”

            “I don’t think so.  I’m just having my lower lids done.  The plastic surgeon said it’s a no brainer.  Besides, this will be my one and only foray into plastic surgery.”

            “I wonder if Jocelyn said that the first time she went under the knife.”

            Luckily, this was not typical of the conversation I had when I told my friends I was having a little “work done.”  Most of them knew that I had been considering, and yes, maybe whining about having my eyes done for some time.  I researched, saved the money and set the date to have the procedure that I hoped would put an end to people saying, “You look tired; are you ok?”  Yet, if someone asked me ten years ago, I would have laughed at the idea of going under the knife for beauty’s sake.  Such things were relegated to Eastside dowagers with faces tight as a drum meandering through the aisles of Bloomingdale's.

            But here I am in the Park Avenue office of my newest acquisition of the middle-aged woman, my very own Plastic Surgeon.  Add him to my colorist, the optician who prescribed my reading glasses, and the nutritionist who, without my asking, informed me that tofu is a natural form of estrogen.  Welcome to the world of elective surgery!

            The whole procedure took about an hour. I rested for a while and while getting dressed, I was able to have a peek at my reflection.  The bruising had not yet kicked in, so with the stitches under my eyes, I looked like a brunette Raggedy Ann doll (sans bags of course).  The stitches were removed within a few days and a week later I was back at the gym on the recumbent bike albeit wearing sunglasses.

            It took about two took months, but I was pleased with the results.  The college student working at the health food store, still calls me Ma’am when he hands me my tofu, but rather than asking if I’m tired, my friends want the name and number of my Plastic Surgeon.  

---