I’m sitting on the Amtrak, hurtling between Washington, D.C., and New York City; the post-industrial mid-East coast rushes past my fogged-up window. I’m on my way to a red-carpet awards ceremony. It’s all very glamorous.
I should be wistfully taking in the scenery, but that’s not what I’m doing. Instead, I’m frantically watching a video of a woman who appears to be in her early 20s teaching me how to apply makeup. Not a specific type of makeup, mind you. Makeup in general. The video is, quite literally, titled “Makeup for Beginners 2024.”
On the one hand, as someone who works in digital storytelling, I have to give props to a headline that’s been perfectly optimized to spit out results that are in total alignment with Google searches like mine. On the other hand, the title of the video was a blatant reminder that I have limited skill when it comes to applying makeup—pretty much close to zero, actually.
As the YouTube video politely put it: Beginner.
It’s not that I reject makeup entirely. It’s mostly that I’ve never learned how to wield its power and complexity with anything resembling…
