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April 29, 2006

Preserving His Sexy...

I know we reserve the phrase “God’s work” for people that find sexual predators or people that run shelters for orphans. Or even people that go all the way in the back of the stock room to be sure there is absolutely not one pair of size 5.5 Gucci gold studded stilettos that I could just look at and hold. Not one? Doesn’t exist in the US, you say? Are you sure?

However, I will boldly say that when it comes to J’s beauty, I mean, hygiene regimen I straight up do God’s work. And it is work.

Bless J’s heart.

It is with a little bit of apprehension that I write this entry. You guys really wanted to know though after I mentioned it at the end of 99 Products. No dude wants his beauty secrets revealed. Especially not a dude like mine. This is a person who had the nickname ODB while he was on tour. Old Dirty and then B for his last name. Trust me, when we started dating I already knew about this moniker and I was not feeling it.

My boyfriend is no frilly, fancy type of mother fucker. This is a man who wears Timberland work boots in the dead of summer with his own band’s basketball shorts. Why his band makes an entire basketball uniform available to purchase – we don’t know.

This is someone who recently called himself a raccoon catcher and spent many nights blasting the lights of his car deep into the backyard in search of this “fucking raccoon man, I swear…” He’d take my baby powder and sprinkle it on the ground and search for tracks the next morning exclaiming, “Don’t say shit! I will replace your powder. I know! You can’t start the day without it, I know! Shut up. We’ve got a raccoon problem!” I would just sit in the car in my house dress at 1 in the morning, shifting in my seat like whatever. The raccoon has yet to be captured. This is another story involving Devil Dogs but this is for another day.

This is a man who is growing a neck beard. Everywhere we go, someone says “You look like a terrorist” or “You look like Matisyahu” or “You look like shit, brah”. Or the girls we know, for some reason, get all ballsy and start running their hands through it like his girlfriend (that’d be me) isn’t standing there looking helluv sideways. Perhaps I’m a jealous person. No, I am a jealous person. We all have some insecurites, give me a break. I don’t appreciate girls getting all cuddly about the beard. Bitch, back it up. I don’t care if they been knowing him all these years. I’m still tripping. Imagine if J’s associates started rubbing up on my boobs if I got some implants – it’s the same. Fine, not really but still. J would not stand for some straight dude to be running his fingers through my hair talking about, “It’s so long!” Point proven.

Where was I?

This is a man who got away with taking press photos for his last album with one testicle out. It’s out there in the world for you to see! His publicist still can’t believe it. But it’s true.

This is the same person who can’t function without his “nervous papers.” He takes the inserts in magazines -- the ones that offer the subscription – and he feels the quality of the paper. If he likes it, he tears it into fours and puts the papers in his pocket. Throughout the day, he’ll take one of the papers, fold it into a triangle and use this to poke under his fingernails. He’s got it down to a science. One-handed and everything. Every week when I go to change the sheets, nervous papers fly out of the bed. Nervous papers in the couch. Nervous papers in the car. Nervous papers in my jacket and in my purse just in case he forgets his. Yes, he’s been photographed for record publicity purposes, holding a nervous paper. It might be in the same photo with his nuts out. Who knows?

My point is, this is a very eccentric non-smoking vegetarian teetotaler who couldn’t be bothered with a beauty regimen.

But I have power. I get delirious with power. And like I said, I do God’s work. I have convinced him that he is totally sexiest when he smells great. I was like, “Babe, you already look exactly like LL.” He loves to hear that.

Then I add, “But what if you smelled like LL too? Now, that would be something!”

He swears he’s got LL’s pout. He makes the face in every photo. He makes the face when he looks at me and is trying to get me to get out of bed to get him some orange juice. He makes the face when he wants me to agree to him buying another guitar that he won’t play because he’s so attached to the red one that is totally bedside just in case he gets an idea in his sleep. Yes, plugged into an amp too. So loud, so unnecessary in the bedroom but what can I do?

I had a link to a photo of him doing the LL pout, but he was terrified to be on blast like that so I removed it. I think he's just scared for people to know he moisturizes.

Slowly but surely, he started to be okay with the beauty regimen. He is still not trying to talk about it. He’s got some kind of insane person reputation to uphold. At the same time, you can’t just ignore your girlfriend and he knows this. Boys, girlfriends are brought into your life to help you be a better you. Don’t you see? How would you know you have to throw out those pleated slacks! Slacks, babe? How would you know you can’t put leftovers in the fridge just on the plate, no foil, no Tupperware? You don’t know so this is why we’re here to tell you not to be an asshole. Just listen up and do what we say. We won’t steer you wrong. Unless of course, you get caught somewhere you ain’t supposed to be. Then know for sure, something’s get burned down and it might be your face.

In the early days, I took note of his beauty regimen or lack thereof.

This is a child who used to wash body and hair with the same soap. And that soap was any old soap that he could find. Remember when I caught him not washing his legs, talking about “the soap trickles down.” Remember that?

Oh, and he used to NEVER wash his face at all! (!) He said it would make him break out. He even went so far as to make all his little grimy friends that agreed with him to come and tell me that they, too, did not wash their faces. I looked right at the red-headed one and said, “You don’t use a washcloth either, do you?” He said he didn’t and I just turned right back around in disbelief.

Maybe it’s a cultural thing. The Great Washcloth Debate of 2005 was a long and arduous one. J and I were filling the cabinets one week when I came to visit. We’d just finished getting glassware and dishes for the kitchen because I said, “Honey, you can’t keep stealing Dunkin Donuts cups every week. You’ve got to just purchase some dishes, for real.”

Now it was time to buy all new fluffy big white towels.

We get to the towel section at Bed Bath & Beyond and I’m standing there trying to find the matching washcloths to the set of bath towels. He looks at me and says, “Why do we need those?”

I swat his arm with the washcloth and I say, “Please, just don’t do this today.”

Again, “No seriously, why?”

I state his first, middle and last name and I say, “Do you honestly think that we don’t need these? What happens if this relationship works out and my daddy comes to visit and we don’t have a single washcloth to offer him to wash his ass? What will happen then?” I asked with straight up incredulity.

He responds dead serious, “He’ll just take a shower without it?”

“No,” I snapped, “He’ll talk shit about you and ME for the rest of my life. He will be baffled and at every function for the rest of our lives together, he will say out loud for all to hear, ‘Yeah, Meleesa little boyfriend don’t wash his ass…’ Is that what you want?”

A lady shopping nearby overheard us and she looked right at J and goes, “It’s true” and walked off.

Once, we stayed in Vegas for a couple nights while we were still doing that long distance relationship thing. No, this was not a chosen vacation. He was working. I really don’t like Vegas unless there’s some sort of hip hop convention there anyway. If Flavor Flav won’t be walking around the casino at 2 in the afternoon eating a grilled cheese with that big ass clock hung from his neck, I am not interested in being in Vegas.

Anyway, he came back to the hotel room that I’d been sitting in alone all day because Vegas carpet + lights + sounds + smoke makes me nauseous. He was tired and grimy. I offered him a neck massage. I tried to find something he’d like to watch on the TV. I offered to order him some hot tea from room service. Finally, in my last attempt to make him feel better, I asked, “Want me to run your shower?”

He said yes and I got up to rifle through his bag to get his toiletries out. Rifling, rifling – nothing. I panic. BABE, YOU FORGOT TO PACK ALL YOUR STUFF! Meaning, this person thought he was just going to get by using the hotel soap and shampoo! The hotel soap! Why, knowing he was known as ODB, I would suddenly believe he’d pack his own shampoo – I don’t know. The bottom line is he was funky. He was a grimy cat and I was like OH HELL NO.

He now washes his face with Natura Bisse face wash. It’s light orange. And I believe Puff Daddy uses it. Puff Daddy doesn’t really use Proactiv and I don’t care who hears me. He uses Natura Bisse! J then exfoliates with my Neutrogena Blackhead Eliminating Scrub. He moisturizes with Diamond Crème from the Natura Bisse line. J is so involved with his NB that he’s made it very clear to me not to touch his stash. It’s stupid expensive because it claims to improve the skin on a deep cellular level. We have to get our insiders at Barney’s to help us out. The price is rude and excessive and just another example of the rich people wanting to keep us looking unkempt and regular so they’ll always look more fly. Well fuck that, you celebrities. I’m on the train too and I know your secrets and I’m using them and I’m sharing them so get with that shit.

I don’t know where that theory just came from about rich people wanting to keep us down. I swear my fingers just typed it out and I read it back to myself and I said KEEP.

For body wash, he uses two. The Dove body wash in the plain white bottle with the blue lid first. Then, I have him layer with the Neutrogena Body Wash, the original gold colored one. That one makes him smell all kinds of delicious. It works better on him than on me which is why I use the blue Rainbath.

He then baby powders the entire body. Go boy.

Now the lotioning up is where I run into some resistance. He doesn’t like the feel of lotion. He says it makes him feel gross. To which I respond, “Do you want to feel gross for a couple minutes while it sinks in or do you want to be ugly and ashy when you’re 40? You decide.” He keeps saying he doesn’t care. Okay then…

He will apply it to his hands which are exposed so thank you India for that, but otherwise it’s still a constant struggle.

For cologne, he wears this stuff called Clean from the Sephora dude section. Clear square bottle. I am not that into cologne but this one really is just a clean, fresh smell so I don’t mind it.

He doesn’t shave so I can’t help you there. Which just got me thinking – is he washing that beard hair?

OH NO!

Posted by melissah at April 29, 2006 03:43 PM