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Sombody's Sort of Perfect

"Your right one is perfect," she said. "But the left..."Her voice trailed off, filling in the space where words should be with the tkk, tkk, tkking of her tongue against her teeth.

The salon calls her an aesthetician.

I call her the waxer plucker.

"The left one's too thin," she said, the line between her own brows scrunching together. But since I'd told her it's always been that way and it's not likely to change, her only recourse, she decided, was to tilt my head back again and apply the sharp point of the tweezers to make the right brow match the left. As she alternated between the coolness of the tweezers and the warmth of the wax, I thought about how travel--whether it's in your own backyard or abroad--really works a number on you. Sometimes, you come to realize just how competent and capable you are as you face situations that call for skills you didn't know you had. Sometimes, you enjoy the temporary thrill of being the exotic other; rather ordinary in your own setting, you've become extraordinary and maybe even downright sexy. And sometimes, you realize you're somebody's version of sort of perfect.

But mostly not.

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Posted by Julie in Novoarte's Travel Blog on 14 Feb 2008
Filed in China , USA , Cuba