Looking Good - Jane Eyre style

Originally written
Tuesday, 3. January 2006, 22:39:43


Recently, I had subscribed to daily emails that gave tips/advice (fun or silly depending) to help me become more charming...why not hey?

The other day I got an email about Frump ... that I should avoid it at all cost. Now, this email slapped me in the face because well...I have gained some weight and have become rather 'frump-a-licious'.

According to the experts, there is no such thing as 'frump-a-licious. (frump meaning the lack of care in one's appearance - don't do one's hair, wear grubbies in public etc).

It has been bothering me ever since. I have always been the type of person that for the most part, when it comes to fashion, has not really (depending on the day) cared what I looked like. I can go out without make up and I have been know to frequent the grocery stores in my pj bottoms (when laundry has been neglected or I feel particularly bloated...yes, it is true). I have always maintained that it really doesn't matter what a person looks like, it matters what they are like on the inside.

It just so happened that as I was reading Charlotte Bronte's Jane Erye she addressed the same topic but she put it in words that didn't so much slap as they did gently nudged.

"I rose; I dressed myself with care: obliged to be plain - for I had no article of attire that was not made with extreme simplicity - I was still by nature solicitous to be neat.It was not my habit to be disregardful of appearance, or careless of the impression I made: on the contrary, I ever wished to look as well as I could, and to please as much as my want of beauty would permit."

There you have it. Ever the sage that Jane is. It's really that simple, beauty is an effort to do the best with what you have. She wasn't a handsome woman herself, she being rather little, pale, with irregular features. She was plain...Jane. And yet, I love her...she is one of the most endearing female characters ever written (so far anyway). Jane teaches how we need to take what we have and fully use it to our advantage.

Appearance to her, I think, was a way of reflecting on the outside who she was on the inside. She wasn't trying to catch a man, she wasn't vain, she wasn't obsessed. She color coordinated her spirit with her body if you will.

So, there you have it, I am going to cease all disregarding of my appearance and careless making of my impressions. May this tiny little thought help where it may...if only to get you to read Jane Eyre (again and again)...and to let you know that you are indeed beaut-a-licious!