When I got tested I wore a full face of makeup and a skirt. I wanted the testers to see my outfit and think I looked responsible. They’d immediately understand I’ve really been trying not to be a part of the problem, and that I’ve arrived at this drive-thru testing site not because I haven’t been social distancing, but because of a fluke — that one stranger who got a little too close that one time. Because as nurses combating a pandemic, they definitely had enough brainspace to evaluate my lipstick choice.
As the Q-tip hit my throat I squeezed my mom’s hand from the passenger seat. Not because the test was particularly painful –– I was trying not to have a panic attack. I’ve been trying not to make this situation about me, but I’d be lying if I said I was extricable.
Remarkably, I didn’t have a panic attack. Instead I got a stress migraine. On the way home, my mom picked up chicken lemon rice soup. At home as my migraine stirred my stomach, I paced the hallway trying not to throw it up. That would ruin my makeup.
Only a week prior, as my mom and I drove home from Ann Arbor after taking graduation photos, I had to make her pull over, seized by a panic attack. Maybe it was being out of the house for too long, or maybe Ann Arbor reminds me of my academic anxieties, but I ran out of the car into the stretch of forest running along the highway, hyperventilating in the ruffled pink dress I had purchased solely for the occasion. I had always wondered what filled the space beyond the highway. I can now tell you that if you run deep enough into the forest, you’ll reach a barbed wire fence, and if your brain is too distracted by panic, you’ll end up stepping into mud puddles, ruining your shoes. My sister said I looked cinematic, ethereal: a lone girl in a new dress, head in hands, walking into a forest. It didn’t feel that way. My mom fetched me from the side of the road, ushered me back into the car. I tightened my fist around my seatbelt, and again tried not to throw up. Again, it would ruin my makeup.
Once I got home I stripped off my muddy dress and attacked my face with makeup remover. I had failed at looking normal, looking responsible, despite my rigid commitment to a costume of normalcy. I kept thinking about how the cars passing by on the highway must’ve thought I was insane. I kept hoping that the nurses didn’t mistake my earnest plan for conceitedness.
My test ended up being negative, but that doesn’t mean I’m not sick from coronavirus. I would never equivocate anything else with COVID-19, but I will say I believe coronavirus causes more than just one illness. It catalyzes agoraphobia, depression, crippling paranoia, nonphysical social distancing, anxiety, and of course, devastatingly, COVID-19.
Today I had enough courage to go to the post office. Before I left I stared in the mirror with my mask on, trying to determine if people could tell when I’m smiling at them. I think they can.
I put on lipstick, too. For myself, I think. Turns out, it still made me feel as special from under a mask as when others can see it too. Maybe that’s a sign I’ve internalized beauty standards too deeply, but I think it’s actually more likely that lipstick under my facemask is just me trying to love myself.
Carly Ryan || Royal Oak, MI || May 18, 2020