mismatched stubs lengthened and strengthened with all sorts of fake jiggery-pokery.
I didn’t believe her because nothing ever works for me, but I went along anyway, out of curiosity, to a new nailbar. Where I spent a long, boring –
and painful
– ninety minutes: my ‘well wisher’ hadn’t warned me that it
hurts
as they solder the fakey nails to your real, crappy nails. But it was worth it. I emerged one amazed hour and a half later with ten supermodel-style nails. Unbelievably, they didn’t look remotely fake, just very, very beautiful.
And suddenly, miraculously, with my long, glam nails, I was transformed. I thought I was
IT
. It wasn’t just my nails which had been enhanced, my entire
hand
had been upgraded. Even my
arms
and
shoulders
looked more elegant. I kept clattering my new nails impatiently, even when I wasn’t impatient –
just because I could
… I became more dynamic, I spoke faster and louder and gesticulated more with my hands. To my surprise, I became slightly bitchy; I think it’s easier to get away with catty comments when you’ve long nails. In fact, I felt it was nearly
expected
of me.
It wasn’t all fun and games, of course; there are always side effects – I could no longer type, I had to use a pen to make phone calls and it took me over ten minutes to pick a safety pin off the carpet (in the end I had to kick it up with the toe of my boot and catch it mid-air). None of whichseemed like a problem! Instead I thought I was fantastically glam.
And how was I going to cope when I was under stress, once I couldn’t bite my nails any more? I contemplated getting false ones to bite, the way people get fake fags once they’ve given up smoking. Or indeed, I could take up smoking!
For the first time in my life I started buying nail varnishes; I felt as if I’d been finally let into a club that I’d always been barred from. Naturally, being me, I went a bit mental and went on an over-the-top rampage of opaques and clears and metallics and glitterys and opalescents…
Mistakes were made, of course. I bought one varnish which was described as plum, but in reality it was chestnut – or in other words,
brown
. I looked as though I’d got all ten of my nails caught in a door. But we live and learn. I was on a steep learning curve and I had the occasional success. Another one, which the ad said had been ‘inspired by the dazzle of gemstones’ was
extremely
glam: like I was wearing garnets on the ends of my fingers and I kept telling dramatic stories just so I could wave my hands around and light up the air with flashes of luminous red light. Happy days…
Within no time I was utterly dependent on my nails. Without them I felt like Samson without his hair – naked and devoid of power. However, nothing had prepared me for how high maintenance they were. I had to get them done every two weeks because they grew so fast – which was very odd because all my life, when I’d been depending on my real, underneath, stubby nails to grow, the little shaggers had stubbornly refused to budge. It was as bad as having tomonitor the roots of my hair, only worse, because I only needed to get my roots done every three weeks. And the roots of my hair don’t suddenly grow a long grey inch overnight – but breaking a nail was the work of an instant. And it happened. The first time, I was distraught at the sight of nine long, glossy talons and one short, bald, funny-shaped stub. In the olden days I’d have been first in the queue to laugh at a girl who was upset about breaking a nail. But it was all different now. I knew exactly how distressing it was and a broken nail had the same effect on me as Kryptonite on Superman. It was an important life lesson to learn: you know what, I realized, we should never judge. Not until we’ve walked a mile on another person’s hands…
But eventually the maintenance began to weary me. Up-keep was a constant worry, requiring round-the-clock vigilance, and the nails
I didn’t believe her because nothing ever works for me, but I went along anyway, out of curiosity, to a new nailbar. Where I spent a long, boring –
and painful
– ninety minutes: my ‘well wisher’ hadn’t warned me that it
hurts
as they solder the fakey nails to your real, crappy nails. But it was worth it. I emerged one amazed hour and a half later with ten supermodel-style nails. Unbelievably, they didn’t look remotely fake, just very, very beautiful.
And suddenly, miraculously, with my long, glam nails, I was transformed. I thought I was
IT
. It wasn’t just my nails which had been enhanced, my entire
hand
had been upgraded. Even my
arms
and
shoulders
looked more elegant. I kept clattering my new nails impatiently, even when I wasn’t impatient –
just because I could
… I became more dynamic, I spoke faster and louder and gesticulated more with my hands. To my surprise, I became slightly bitchy; I think it’s easier to get away with catty comments when you’ve long nails. In fact, I felt it was nearly
expected
of me.
It wasn’t all fun and games, of course; there are always side effects – I could no longer type, I had to use a pen to make phone calls and it took me over ten minutes to pick a safety pin off the carpet (in the end I had to kick it up with the toe of my boot and catch it mid-air). None of whichseemed like a problem! Instead I thought I was fantastically glam.
And how was I going to cope when I was under stress, once I couldn’t bite my nails any more? I contemplated getting false ones to bite, the way people get fake fags once they’ve given up smoking. Or indeed, I could take up smoking!
For the first time in my life I started buying nail varnishes; I felt as if I’d been finally let into a club that I’d always been barred from. Naturally, being me, I went a bit mental and went on an over-the-top rampage of opaques and clears and metallics and glitterys and opalescents…
Mistakes were made, of course. I bought one varnish which was described as plum, but in reality it was chestnut – or in other words,
brown
. I looked as though I’d got all ten of my nails caught in a door. But we live and learn. I was on a steep learning curve and I had the occasional success. Another one, which the ad said had been ‘inspired by the dazzle of gemstones’ was
extremely
glam: like I was wearing garnets on the ends of my fingers and I kept telling dramatic stories just so I could wave my hands around and light up the air with flashes of luminous red light. Happy days…
Within no time I was utterly dependent on my nails. Without them I felt like Samson without his hair – naked and devoid of power. However, nothing had prepared me for how high maintenance they were. I had to get them done every two weeks because they grew so fast – which was very odd because all my life, when I’d been depending on my real, underneath, stubby nails to grow, the little shaggers had stubbornly refused to budge. It was as bad as having tomonitor the roots of my hair, only worse, because I only needed to get my roots done every three weeks. And the roots of my hair don’t suddenly grow a long grey inch overnight – but breaking a nail was the work of an instant. And it happened. The first time, I was distraught at the sight of nine long, glossy talons and one short, bald, funny-shaped stub. In the olden days I’d have been first in the queue to laugh at a girl who was upset about breaking a nail. But it was all different now. I knew exactly how distressing it was and a broken nail had the same effect on me as Kryptonite on Superman. It was an important life lesson to learn: you know what, I realized, we should never judge. Not until we’ve walked a mile on another person’s hands…
But eventually the maintenance began to weary me. Up-keep was a constant worry, requiring round-the-clock vigilance, and the nails
Similar Books
