I always wanted to be the kind of woman who wore lipstick. My mom was completely anti-makeup. She tells a story about how she entirely made up one eye and missed the other and how no one could tell the difference. I was an artistic child, and makeup seemed like a special kind of art supply you could use on your face. Lipstick, being crayon-like and appearing in a wide assortment of bright colors, held particular appeal. I loved watching women put it on in restaurants after popping open their little compact mirrors. That, I thought, was what I would do when I was a grown woman.
Because my mom didn’t wear lipstick, I looked to my aunt for guidance. When I’d go over to visit, I’d carefully watch her entire makeup routine, making copious mental notes. In middle school I started wearing concealer and powder to mask my acne-covered oily skin. Eventually that lead to eye shadow, mascara, and the kind of lip products popular among teens in the early 90s: the more glitter, the better. Between slathering plastic on my lips and a severe anti-acne regimen, I became addicted to lip balm.
Lip balm and lipstick don’t work very well together. Lipstick makes your lips dry, and lip balm is an effective lipstick remover. I couldn’t be the woman at the restaurant, taking her shiny black tube of lipstick out of her tiny handbag and slowly twisting the red point up to apply it to her pout because my lips must be fully hydrated at all times.
Makeup companies have attempted to work around this problem, and believe me, I’ve tried them all. Moisturizing lipsticks exist, but “moisturizing” is a gross exaggeration at best. I’ve tried the glosses that you apply with a little sponge at the end of a stick (they’re usually quite sticky) and even the product that comes with a special balm that you’re supposed to apply after. (The balm just doesn’t moisturize quite enough.) I have one that goes on purple, then you spray your lips and the purple stuff hardens so you can peel it off. It’s like the green color-changing lipstick from the grocery store checkout lanes in the 80s that was supposed to make your lips the perfect color for your skin tone, but purple, more expensive, and sold on Instagram. The color is supposed to stain your lips. It works, in that after peeling off the purple stuff I look like I ate a popsicle the day before.
The thing that works best is tinted lip balms. Bonne Bell, best known for the lip balm of the 90s—Lip Smackers, had a line called LipLix that had a bit more tint to it. I remember liking a shade flavored after raisins—yes, raisins—and a better branded strawberry flavor. But even with the LipLix, I still have the embarrassing problem of getting lipstick on my teeth. As I’ve tried every attempt at a moisturizing lip tint, I’ve also tried every technique in the book to prevent color from leaving my lips and eventually applying itself to my front chompers. I’ve dabbed, I’ve puckered, I’ve licked my finger and pulled it through my lips and kissed tissues. It doesn’t matter, my lips end up feeling dry and my teeth end up with pink spots.
I haven’t given up. On my desk sits a little pouch with a cat printed on the front, and inside are various lipsticks. Sometimes I’ll put one on, even though I’m not going anywhere, and my coworkers only see me on Zoom. The other day I put some on, and when I came downstairs my husband asked if I’d eaten a crayon.
Perhaps one day the lovely, lipstick-wearing goddess I am in my head and the actual lip balm wearing woman with big teeth I am in real life will somehow become one. Or maybe the beauty industry will invent the holy grail of products: tooth-repellent lipstick that can be worn under regular lip balm. Whatever they come up with, you know I’ll be trying it.
I don’t wear lipstick but I can relate to wanting hydrated lips at all times. I’ve been addicted to the blue Chapstick for as long as I can remember. I hope you find what you’re looking for.