The Cover-up

Au naturale, baby!  It's the preferred modus operendi for moi. This includes refraining from piling the makeup on. A few years back, I began changing habits to make my skin so healthy that it rarely if ever needs makeup to cover imperfections. 
Oh, there are natural imperfections.

Imperfections are far from imperfect, they only serve to make someone human, more real, more genuine. A sort of "what you see is who I am" attitude, so it goes.

There are other types of cover ups, too. Yupp, I'm going to go there, ha ha!

It's the "L" word. Lying. The sort that people use to cover up misdeeds, insecurities, occasionally their privacy. In today's world where the simple truths of who someone is can be used against them, it makes telling a lie or a "half-truth" almost a necessity to avoid shame, ostracizing, stereotyping.

Many people seem to cling to what WAS the norm 10 - 20 years ago. 
Age is far different, now.
Socioeconomic's are far from what used to be.
Stereotyping by age, gender, race. They reveal ignorance.

Having been discriminated against for my age, my race, my religion, even my food choices, the sting of prejudice has landed on my doorstep.

Having mover to a very small town in 2012, I see it more concentrated. 
The discrimination is more concentrated on myself, being an "outsider".
I went to High School in the north, I'm unmarried, my children rarely come around.
The people in this town are surface friendly for the most part, as in, they don't want to come to my home, they don't want to me to come to their home. Unless I married or one of my children moved in with me, I'm a pariah.

Welcome to small town, America!

After 6 years, although I'm a friendly, outgoing person, there is exactly *TWO* female friends who I consider a friend.
The rest..........wellllllllllll.

It has been expressed to me on a few occasions that I'm regarded by most in this town as a weed smoking lesbian.

I don't smoke weed, nor do I wish to have a male companion in my life. Having not met the right one for me, I refuse to settle ever again as I settled when I married. 

Covering up with too much makeup or covering up the way I truly feel is a foreign concept, to me. 
It's called "wearing your heart on your sleeve."

Being imperfect, I have been cajoled into telling a fib or 2 for self protection. It's the way of the world. It lightly touches me, at times.

I'm only human, sometimes vulnerable.

Still, only human.