My mother’s eyes meet mine in the oval mirror over her vanity table. Then she shifts in her chair, and I watch as her fingers spiral a red tube out of its black case. Over time, the lipstick has been pressed flat as a round penny. She applies its color to her bottom lip, then presses her lips together and perfectly transfers the brightness to her top lip. Even more impressively, later in the day she will repeat this ceremony wherever she may be, without benefit of a mirror. The first magic trick I ever saw and a good one.
Mary Armao McCarthy’s writing has been sprinkled over literary publications for many years. She is past president of the Hudson Valley Writers Guild. Facebook: Mary Armao McCarthy