Makeup can make me feel beautiful: makeup can make me feel fierce. Winged eyeliner can transform me into an Ancient Goddess; bright lipstick can turn me into a pop star, and foundation can promise me youth.
And just by offering that, it’s a kind of liberty. More or less, we all use the same makeup, so how I wear it gives me a say in which parts of me make me up and if that means not wearing makeup, that too says something about me. Whether or not I wear it in itself speaks for my inner self and what it wants to look like.
In that freedom, there’s identity. And if that identity genuflects my inner ferocity or my inner intensity, how I made up might just say a whole lot more about me than what it looks like.