The beauty of fine lines

Chandni Chandel

Chandni Chandel

Contours, the fine lines on our face, have many stories to tell as we age. The deeper the thought, the deeper the line. Botox and other treatments might do away with these deep lines temporarily, but as you grow old, they become an inseparable part of your life history. Men store their unspoken thoughts deep in their hearts; women’s faces express it all, a gateway to their heart.

Any well-meaning woman who has gone through day-to-day rigours and travails of life will have these contours. Each contour has come from somewhere, it has a story. My grandmother’s face was clear, except two straight lines running down the cheekbones, touching the chin. She was straightforward, mostly kept to herself, did not create unnecessary stress in life, unlike most women who are prone to undue worries.

My maternal grandmother had three lines across the forehead. She was a doer, moving around to manage the household chores, looking after grandchildren, chit-chatting with a cross-section of people. She would smile and laugh; when she did, her forehead lines deepened and broadened.

My grandmother-in-law had a face criss-crossed with lines, her struggle and hard work in the hills had a story. The hard labour to take care of a family, which wasn’t just a family of four like in the present days, she had a huge joint family of about 50 members, later her own of about 15 members, and then her grandchildren visiting her during vacation.

I, too, have a frown on my face, which doesn’t represent any kind of anger, but a kind of helplessness in unwarranted situations. These facial expressions nonetheless become a part of your personality. Though skin specialists, dermatologists and medical science may have a scieintific explanation for these contours as natural ageing, for the possessor, these are stories.

Since ages, a woman’s hard labour has been giving her the much-needed strength to bear. Getting up before dawn to sleeping the last was usual for women who became the torch-bearers of a family’s rise. Earlier, even though it was a patriarchial society, if a woman had the audacity and calibre she did outdo men, and men accepted it.

As was depicted in Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s Ram-Leela and Bajirao Mastani, female predominance was a part of Indian culture. Men respected women who had the gumption to take on the world. It wasn’t by chance that these women got paramount roles, destiny threw them into trying circumstances. They fought their own battles and then the men bowed to their grit.