Superman dashed into telephone booths to remove his Clark Kent business suits. I found a dank, dark bathroom at the Conservatorium to morph from an unfashionable university student to fashionable supermodel. Well, I wasn’t that super but don’t let the facts get in the way of a good metaphor.
Located in the basement, the bathroom facilitated my secret double life.
I crossed North Terrace to go from the institution of learning to the institution of commercialism and vice versa. Never the twain would meet despite the frenetic pace. It was as if I was responding to an ongoing emergency, but who was I saving?
Here’s a map of my short journey across the busy city road, North Terrace, Adelaide, South Australia…
One moment I was in the basement bathroom piling on makeup to do a modelling job and the next I was back, removing makeup to attend a lecture. High heels were replaced with low heels. Fake, spangly jewellery was hidden in a drawstring bag. I brushed the hairspray out and pulled my hair into a tight bun. I was nondescript again. Blending into walls. Doing the serious work of perfecting classical music performance.
But I get ahead of myself.
Here’s how my working life evolved…
I had Suzy to thank for my first fashion modelling job.
Willowy Suzy had, mid-pivot, caught her right big toe in her stiletto heel, tilted to the point of almost snapping, yelped, and fallen off the catwalk right in the middle of a parade.
For all her poise, she had hit the floor with a graceless thud, twisting an ankle and breaking a collarbone.
I had to save the day. At last. My mission was crystal clear.
In the department store change room, before the fashion parade, hairspray hung in the stifled air. Hairbrushes were flung from corner to corner. Models double knotted halter tops and worried over skimpy bikinis. They cursed the number of buttons, zips, and buckles on a series of clothes they were allocated to wear. Lipstick and jewellery were whisked about. Stockings, shoes, scarves, slips, and shoulder pads were coordinated for every outfit. Kneeling assistants endlessly pulled and smoothed and gathered and folded and were socked in the eye or kicked in the ankle or taunted for fumbling in the muggy heat of a madhouse. Breathing was negotiable. Every second counted.
On the catwalk I lost the pull of gravity. I basked in the heat of the spotlights. I cruised above the clouds, following the plan. I smiled as I fulfilled the potential my grooming and deportment instructor, Claudine, had seen in me. I watched all my cares disappear. I merged with the dream, and it was better than anything real. So simple. So silly. So surreal. At the age of seventeen I found myself living a bit, or so I thought.
Back in the change room, after the fashion parade had ended, Top Model Juliet made comments when the mood took her. Ears were tuned to the fragile frequency of Juliet’s voice. Juliet would feel like glossy paper to touch. In her underwear, she stood in front of the mirror. “I think my knees need toning.”
She flicked at the flesh with her nails. Pale skin reddened. “Look at those lardy lumps. Where’s my fake tan?”
And off she floated in search of satisfaction. All eyes followed her. What brand of tanning lotion was she using? Was that a new ring she was wearing? Had she really gained weight?
One day the gossip reached fever-pitch in the change room when Patricia was dismissed from a parade.
“Have you heard? Patricia was a centrefold in Playboy. The store doesn’t want her in their parade,” someone said from behind a curtain.
Surely it was a mistake, a misunderstanding. Patricia had thick auburn hair, unblemished skin, high cheekbones, green-grey eyes, straight white teeth. She had to be a “happy ever after girl” with looks like that. How could she have fallen short of the ideal?
But every fashion model knew the fate of a Playboy bunny. A bunny was condemned for life, thrown scraps, exploited. Forever roaming the limbo land of singledom. Poor Patricia. No decent man would marry her now.
“How did the department store find out?” Juliet wondered. “Did some creatin dob her in?”
Everyone looked mystified and mortified.
Before Patricia took her leave, she turned to me and whispered, “I needed the money. My boyfriend left me with bills to pay. I wish I was you.”
I didn’t know what to say. Patricia had to be desperate to want to be me. An odd heat radiated from Patricia’s skin and her eyes had a feverish flash to them. She’d crossed an invisible line but who knew exactly where sanctioned sexuality became unsanctioned sexuality, where sexy became slutty, or when confidence became bitchy?
It was hard to breathe. The dim light in the change room dimmed even further. Shadows swirled around my ankles and the ground beneath my feet felt spongy like sand.
“Be careful,” Patricia said. She looked away and opened her mouth then changed her mind and closed it.
By the time I thought to say goodbye and good luck, Patricia had left.
Tina, the department store’s fashion co-ordinator, fired models for the tiniest error: wrong stockings, messy hair, a sloppy walk on the catwalk. No one knew what Tina preferred.
“Sometimes it’s upbeat and kinda jerky, the next it’s smooth and sloshy,” Juliet said, throwing up her arms. As for the style of hair required, models just scratched their heads. “Tina fires girls for having a pimple.”
Behind Tina’s back, the models called her “Tiny Tina”. Eyes rolled skyward. “Fus-sy,” they mouthed at each other.
When Tina was around, I hunched my shoulders. My guts rumbled louder. I was thirsty because I couldn’t risk bloating. Dismissal hovered above me, as heavy as a killer whale.
At Petunia’s, Claudine scrambled around her metallic bag. “Tina is on our case about weight. She doesn’t want girls with flesh. I mean, you’ve got to be thin and curvy. Strong but soft.”
I nodded my head to disguise how muddled I felt. And tired. So very, very tired.
“Here… these will help.” Claudine gave me a bottle of pills.
Perhaps the laxatives would save me. All the fashion models took pills. Even Fran at the music shop had made a daily meal of them. I couldn’t afford to get comfortable in the beauty chain. With Patricia gone, I had to keep my head down amid the reshuffle or I too might be left out or left behind or blacklisted. What would become of me then?
A strawberry-blonde soon eclipsed the race to replace Patricia. Even Juliet seemed fazed, peering sideways at her new partner when she thought no-one was watching.
Instead of taking the laxatives I took to the hills to exorcise the evil fat from my hips. I hired an exercise bike, a rower, and a set of dumb bells and crammed them into my parent’s garage. I tried to live on air, but battling relentless hunger was hard. As much as I bossed it about, my body rebelled against starvation. I had to work harder. Concentrating for hours practising the piano every day became increasingly arduous. The boredom, the cold, the loneliness made me crave food.
Here's an old photo of my modelling days… this was taken at some sort of launch for a new car. I’m second from the right.
Top Model Juliet read Vogue magazines. She studied the photos, tilting the pages this way and that. Her fingers brushed and pressed and tapped. The tip of her tongue flicked across her bottom teeth as she studied each page.
I bought Cosmopolitan and Cleo magazines and read them on the train into the city. I hid them between my music books. I did the quizzes: “Are you and your boyfriend compatible?” I studied things that were in and things that were out. A-List celebrities and Z-List forgettables. Makeup dos and makeup don’ts. Clothes to adore and clothes to throw out. I mentally ticked the boxes. If I lost a bit more weight, if I bought that same brand of eye shadow and those shoes… if hairdresser Genaro cut my hair like the cover girl… if I lifted my chin, tilted my head, and drew my shoulders back, I’d have the perfect life, the perfect love, the perfectly happy ever after.
My first pay cheque was for two hundred dollars with fifty dollars taken out for Petunia’s management of my bookings. Commission? No-one had told me about a commission. I felt – well – numb.
If I talked with anyone it was Meredith. Meredith was about thirty-seven years old, so she modelled clothes for the more mature woman. I matched Meredith in height and complexion, so we were sometimes teamed together. I had to wear boring safari suits and mother-of-the-bride outfits and twin sets to correspond with Meredith’s range.
Come to think on it, I modelled a lot of boring clothes. Here are some examples. This is me on the far left and on the far right…
And here’s another photo shoot for newspaper advertising… not glamorous in the slightest! And what’s with my hair? It’s the 80s perm!
One day Meredith said, “Let’s go for coffee together in the break.”
It was a chance to ask Meredith about Petunia’s commission, if I could get a word in edgewise.
“My husband’s away again. Interstate, you know, on business,” Meredith said as soon as the coffees arrived.
I nodded as was expected.
“It’s lonely at home. An empty house.” Meredith picked up a spoon with her left hand and stirred her cappuccino. Huge diamonds glittered. “We’ve just had the bathroom renovated. Big spa, too many mirrors. I can’t get used to seeing my body from all angles.”
My cheeks reddened as naked Meredith clambered into her spa.
“You’d be okay.” Meredith was saying. “Young body like yours.”
I hid behind my coffee cup.
“Come over and check it out. It’d be fun. We could pop a bottle of champagne.”
The conversation, the closeness, stuck to my skin like leucoplast. I looked around for an exit sign.
“I’ve got this special bubble bath that makes you really…” Meredith’s tongue curled inside her mouth… “soft.”
The word “soft” was an air-blown kiss floating across the table.
I left as soon as I could without appearing rude. I tried not to think about mirrors, spas, or bubble baths. I tried not to think much beyond the seesaw from one stage to another every time I crossed North Terrace. Both sides of the road required conformity – one to a beauty ideal, the other to a musical ideal. The days blurred. The tension climbed as the fragmentation within me deepened and widened.
My waking hours were accompanied by hunger pangs that dulled my thinking. The busyness numbed my feelings. My heart was a pendulum that hollowly knocked against my ribs. My feet marched like a good soldier to every appointment, lecture, lesson. I was never late. I was saving the day. I was finding a way to fit in and perfection was my north star. What else mattered?
The problem was none of it mattered. Most of it was smoke and mirrors. An oscillation between my inner and outer worlds that were trapped on a weird, dual-carriage treadmill. Somewhat like busy North Terrace itself with its three lanes going one way, and its three lanes going the other. This intense time of my life was a bit like trying to go up and down an escalator at the same time. But it didn’t have a feeling of ascension or descension. This was a horizontal oscillation and the faster the speed, the greater the illusion that I was getting somewhere. To employ another metaphor, I was busy pushing the accelerator pedal and the brake at the same time. I wasn’t getting anywhere for all my exhaustion, starvation and determination.
As for my true potential, I was only skimming the surface.
As for fitting in, I increasingly felt the heavy fist of alienation ironing my spirit flat.
As for saving the day, perhaps I needed Superman to save me. Perhaps I’d become my own emotional kryptonite. Perhaps I was my worst enemy, as dastardly as Lex Luthor or General Zod. Perhaps I’d battled Doomsday and lost my mind.
I was wearing costumes and my life was a comic strip of newspaper photographs. Perfection was an empty promise and I was perpetuating a lie. It’d take me a long time to wake up.
I’ve so much more to tell you. Thank you for joining me on this journey. It means the world. Please like and comment if you feel moved to and if not, that’s okay too.
With love,
Lil X
Gifted Potential (Part Two)