Mirror Mirror on the wall, who’s the fairest of all!
The words still fill the air. The world full of admirers! Admiration for the things that appeals the eyes. Beauty! Well that’s how it is defined. Its presence brings pleasure from within. It tingle your senses. It has power to soothe your nerves. Something you can feel. It touches you within. The power of colours, textures, lines, curves and beyond blended together to create a masterpiece. It can be a painting on a wall or your own creation that you hold in your hands.
When we look back, in our epics, all sins cause physical deformities and hence gods were beautiful and demons ugly. Even if a hero was not appealing, it actually turned handsome and dashing by the end of the story, whether it was a frog or a beast and if they failed to transform they simply RIP – Elephant Man, King Kong, Frankenstein and so on fill this sad side. It was beauty that made Cleopatra immortal. Even our bollywood accepted beauties in beautiful form only whether it is Naseeb apna apna or Khoon Bhari Maang.
It is said beauty comes from within. It is not the superficial appearance but the aura or the glow that comes from within makes it worth being a priceless creation. Afterall “All that glitters is not gold”. It is the soul that connects. As Plato opined that beauty lies in the eyes of beholder, and hence Om Puri, Pankaj Kapur, Micheal Jackson marked their presence with their talent and not the looks. We love them for what they are.
But yet we keep the first benchmark any physical appearance. “Extremely fair, beautiful, tall, thin girl for a smart, handsome boy….blah blah” is the first criteria for most of the arrange marriages in India. Second step, meet the parents, combined interaction of the girl with the family and the boy and bingo! She is beautiful. Look at her eyes, her features. The offspring is going to be fair enough. And the matrimonial alliance is accomplished. After the marriage, truth unravel and family either sees “beauty and the beast” or “beast in the beauty”.
When I look at such proposals, I visualize myself standing in a bakery shop, at the counter, looking at the mesmerizing mouth watering creations behind the glass wall. I can touch the cold glass wall, but not beyond. I inhale deeply to feel the aroma but it is all trapped like a princess in a castle. After emptying my pockets I am the wishful master, wondering if it is stale or fresh, worth every penny I spent on it.
Oh I don’t believe in all this sh*t! I don’t believe in beauty. It doesn’t matter whether I am beautiful or not. This is the response I hear when at times I get in a discussion about beauty. But I feel there is not even a single woman on this earth who doesn’t believe in beauty. Every female feels she is beautiful but the criterion is different. There can be a few categories.
Few say, I don’t believe in parlours. I am what I am. I call them nature worshippers or Cleopatras. As they believe they are beautiful and are reluctant for any experiments.
The next category includes the majority who feel they are beautiful, but just need a little brushing and polishing to become “purrfect”. Thanks to them parlours never run in losses, whatever world is suffering or going through. For a happy client recession never exists. I address them as vanity cases.
Lastly are few who feel god is unfair to them and what god didn’t give them, a cosmologist or plastic surgeon will. The Rakhi Sawants.
But in the ends, one question, how she determines what category she choose depends on the eyes in which she sees her reflection. She lives her moments to see her reflection, in the eyes of her admirer, yes, mirror mirror ..…
