Water Drops and Eyeliner

“Water drops and eyeliner”
The house where I grew up only had one small bathroom. At any given time, there would be someone in the bath tub, someone standing at the sink and someone sitting on the toilet, and any of these someones could have reached out and touched any other someone. There were five of us; Mom and Daddy, Andrea (the oldest), Jamie (the only boy) and me (the baby).The only person who always got privacy in the bathroom was my daddy. For any of the rest of us, it was fair game all the time. Needless to say, we are not very modest in my family.
Of course, the older we got the bigger burden this bathroom sharing thing became. My oldest sister was the worst offender; she often took two showers a day and finally got smart enough to keep the rest of us locked out. Looking back, I can say that some of the biggest arguments were for bathroom time. It is also, without a doubt, the thing we all liked least about our house.
Looking back through different eyes, I can describe nearly every detail of that old bathroom. It was literally so small that you could reach the bath tub, sink and toilet by standing in the center of the room. The wiring was as old as the house itself, so the only light was a single, unshaded, light bulb that stuck out from the wall just above the sink. There was a mirror over the sink. Not just any mirror, but an old cherry mirror with nice details. Today that mirror hangs in my sister’s house, still bearing the scar from the one lone light bulb that dangled a little too close and charred the wood.
I remember taking a bath with my older brother, who is in heaven now. We played a game called “Water Man.” We made “hot dogs” and “hamburgers” from washcloths, “apple pies” from bars of soap, and “milkshakes” from the cups we used to rinse our hair. In other words, we played a bathtub version of McDonalds. I still do not know why we called it “Water Man.” I don’t think there was any logic, it just seemed right.
Mostly, looking through the narrow, crooked door of this bathroom I see my mother. My mother is exquisite. She is always impeccably groomed and dressed. I have rarely seen her leave her home without full make-up and hair that looks like she just stepped out of the salon chair. Her lipstick is always a shade of burnt orange, although never the exact same shade. I can’t tell you how many times I have watched her soak her make-up sponge with water, squeeze it out just right and apply a flawless layer of Max Factor Pancake Foundation, Tan # 2 to her creamy skin. Equally as many times, I have watched her tease her hair to a perfect modified beehive (modified for the current decade) and spray it with White Rain Ultra Hold hairspray, the kind in the hot pink and white can. My mother never goes anywhere without her hairspray. However, of all her magical routines, most intriguing to me was her eyeliner. She still wears dark, perfectly placed eyeliner – not the pencil kind, but the kind that comes in a small compact with its own brush; like blush or eye shadow. I simply never could understand how she could make this perfect line with powder and a tiny brush. It truly is a work of art. Of course, for the eyeliner to work, the brush had to be wet – just the right amount of wet. This “just right” typically came from a water droplet on the sink. A drop that had sprayed up from someone washing their hands, or most likely, the water the she squeezed out of her Max Factor sponge. Where ever they came from, there was always a little drop of water or two that she used to wet the end of her eyeliner brush. This method is how she created those beautiful, flawless eyes.
Over the years, particularly as I opted for a black eyeliner pencil and a Bic lighter to achieve my own flawless eyes, I stopped paying attention to the bathroom and my mother for that matter. There were far more interesting things in my teenage world.
Days became months and years, as they do. That bathroom has long since been remodeled, and I am the proud mother of three children, myself. In many ways I am like my mother, in others I am absolutely not. She still hasn’t gotten over the fact that I dare to leave the privacy of my home without make-up. But, one day in particular, as I stood in front of my own slightly larger, slightly more modern (my bulbs have globes) mirror getting dressed for the day and even wearing make-up, I absent- mindedly, dipped my own eyeliner brush in an accidental drop of water and I have never been more thankful, than I was at that moment, to have something so small, yet so significant, connect me to my mother.