I Blame You Clinique DevilLady

My first encounter with a department store cosmetic counter is a bittersweet memory.

I would say I was around the age of fifteen and my grandmother bought me a 30.00 gift certificate for Boston Store as part of my birthday gift. So one sunny afternoon I took the #14 bus all the way to Southridge, which really isn't that far away, maybe like 15 miles or so, but on a bus it took about 45 minutes to get there. So it seemed long to me.

I went there with the intentions on looking at clothes for summer; my birthday is in May. I walked thru the front double glass doors- alone. My first mistake. The second mistake was walking thru the doors that entered right by the Estee Lauder and Co's playground- alone. You know the area where when you walk thru, you will either pick up speed to push thru the women with plastic smiles holding perfume anstrosities. Or you slow up and gaze over the array of colors and breathe in the intoxicating aromas around you, all the while you heart begins to beat a lil faster. Well, I discovered that day I was the latter of the two.

So I kind of mingle with eligible cosmeticians, who were all too eager to sell me their product. But their was one counter that drew me in. Clinique. And I don't know if was their clean white lab coats or because I remember seeing their ads in my teen beauty mags. So now, I never encountered dept store makeup before this intimately so while I did know it would be more expensive than Walgreens prices I had no idea we were talking like mid-teens for one lipstick. But I looked anyway.

So my cosmetician, which I did feel she was all mine because I never had anyone help me shop for colors and give me such personalized interest in what I was going to put on my face, helped me pick two items. Tenderheart Lipstick and Buff Lightening in the Touch Base for Eyes. Took my whole gift certificate but oh man, just holding these items in my hand I felt instantly more beautiful!

When my mother found out what I spent 30 dollars on like a week later, she was pissed. She said I wasted my certificate. I said now way, I did not. I was still happy with my purchase-I bought high end makeup. I was the shit. That is until like a month later I lost my lipstick and my Touchbase dried out and crusted up. And then I return to my budgeted makeup. But returned throughout my 20's for a few high end products but nothing, NOTHING, beats the first time you do it.
And now I buy 95 % entirely MAC.