Eyebrows: Help!

Those of you who still have your natural eyebrows, please hold up your hands.

Okay. Nice show of hands.

Now, let’s see the hands of those who have eyebrows that are not the greatest but still in place and serving you well. 

O-kay. Good count. Thanks!

All those who had your hands in the air are now dismissed. Sorry.

This class is going to discuss and dis-cuss (not really! well, maybe!) the lack of nice regular eyebrows.

When I was a kid like most of you girls in the audience, I had normal eyebrows. Nice shape, nice color.

It was in my teens, when I started to pay attention to them, that they began to let me down.

I first learned to pluck and tweeze the hairs above my eyes from watching my sister Sue do hers.  She had black brows in a perfect arch over big brown eyes. Nice. 

Nice wasn’t my experience. Far from it.

I either took off too many or too little. I never got the hang of tweezing or plucking so I gave that up.

For a few years I let my brows grow in a random patch over my eyes. They were light brown and didn’t call much attention to themselves. They were happy. I was happy.

It was when I discovered waxing that things got out of hand. 

I watched the beauty operator wax patrons a few times and I was so convinced I could follow suit I purchased a large container of eyebrow wax from her. A dab here and a dab there of that hot wax and ole. Pull those hot patches off and I’d have beautiful eyebrows like every one else in that little shop. Ha.

Outcome: eyebrows crooked and eyelids waxed and red.

About that time the industry came out with an eyebrow razor. It was meant to serve those who had a steady hand and a healthy set of eyebrows. I did not possess either. Sure, the pink razor was tiny. But, oh, the damage it could do. Plus, there was blood. For the first time in my eyebrow career. I had sores and blisters. Blood should not appear anywhere near one’s eyebrows. 

Tossing the can of eyebrow wax into the trash, I went back to having my eyebrows done by a professional.

I’m still not without eyebrow dilemmas. Should one color one’s eyebrows? Yes? No? Does one color brows the shade of her beauty shop tinted hair? Do you leave them the wide mixture that they have become with age? Salt, pepper, brown, yellow? Or should one use the aged eyebrow pencil in the make up bag that is closer to auburn than light brown? Color them black as my sister did? Or purple like the girl next door colors her hair?

Or just get rid of them permanently and paint on perfect ones.

Recently, I was told there is yet another option. Tattoo them on and they last forever, ending the dilemma of tweezing, razoring, coloring.

Nope. I swore when my husband came home from Hong Kong with tats I would never go that route. 

I cannot speak to the trend of threading one's eyebrows, as demonstrated above, as I know nothing about it and from the photos I've seen of the practice I'll just stay in the dark, thanks!

How about you? Do you have an eyebrow problem you want to share? Perhaps you've come up with the perfect solution. Please share! Or have you had any other beauty dilemma you can shed light on for us. Comments appreciated.