Long live aging armpits!
An ad for a well-known deodorant brand delivers a dire warning to women—a woman speaking at some sort of gym with other women: if we don't use it, we'll have aged armpits, instead of strong, youthful skin. To prove it, she raises her arm and shows a smooth armpit, with no hair or flesh hanging around. The world may be collapsing, but I guess it's not a matter of arriving at the apocalypse with our armpits in shambles. I ask myself: who cares about the appearance of their armpits? I'm sure many people who care about so many other parts of their body do too.
Personally, I don't think much about my armpits, unless they itch—they do if I start sweating when I'm nervous. So I take advantage of the fact that she's just seen the ad to raise my arms and look at them: they're a little wrinkled and a few hairs are sticking out. They also have some black bumps because I've been wearing a t-shirt of that color all day, which isn't very good quality. Plus, they smell a bit fragrant because I've been in the shower for hours and I'm using a deodorant that isn't antiperspirant—I have a habit of wanting to sweat, what should I do?
It's funny, men's deodorant ads usually promise that women will notice them, no matter what their appearance—it must be that homosexuals don't use it—while women's ads make ridiculous suggestions like having youthful armpits. It's so absurd that I don't have the strength to be indignant, either way. But I also feel lucky, because maintaining youth and the effort it entails generates a huge, enormous, immeasurable indifference in me. Is looking youthful a legitimate goal in this life? I'm not going to be the one to judge others now, but that's not part of my life. In fact, it's getting to the point where I feel like striving to 'look' like things, in general, is pretty pointless.
Whenever I say we're old and fat, there's always someone who says, "No, woman. You're not fat, and you look much younger. You look great." Fuck, just let me live. The point is, I find it wonderful to be old and fat. A fat old lady. What's the problem? Why does my interlocutor feel the need to comfort me? And, above all, why should people nuance my self-concept? Do they think I don't know what we are? It's exhausting.
Obviously, it's impossible not to look like something to other people. But I don't want to control what my appearance tells them, because they're free to interpret it however they want, as I do with the people around me. But there's no need for them to let me know what they think of my appearance. It doesn't hurt either. It's so irrelevant, I'm not willing to waste a second listening to this kind of thing.
I look at my armpits again. I like them. And I'm curious: how many liters of sweat have they released since we've been on this earth? And how many times have I flexed them? What makes a person smell one way or another? Now that's interesting!
