Eek!

Okay, folks, I'm starting to develop a teeny-tiny peeve with life in Smallville. Is it that there is no Indian restaurant? Actually I'm handling that okay, thanks to strategic restaurant choices when I'm in more diverse areas. How about not being able to see Broken Flowers, Junebug, or Thumbsucker? I wish I could see those independent movies, but at least I know I can rent them someday. All hail Netflix, the savior of the geographically isolated. Or how about the fact that the $25 hairstylist really didn't do much for your glorious curls? Well, I'm not sure what I'm going to do about that.

Here's the problem: I can't find auburn mascara. I've looked at the chain pharmacy and at the chain grocery store. No dice. Just black black and pitch black with a few blackened browns thrown in.

You see, I'm a redhead. When I was young it was bright copper with strawberry blond highlights, but now it looks much more auburn. Pale skin? Check. Freckles? Check. How about invisible eyelashes? Yes, I have those too! But black mascara looks horrible on me (and I would venture to say LOTS of women). It looks harsh, and if it flakes or runs at all, it gives the appearance of awful dark circles under the eyes (even where there are none).

I was never willing to shell out the shekels for the fancy redhead mascara, but I settled for the cheap drugstore version. It seems like such a simple thing, to find a national brand mascara in a chain drugstore. It's not like the fact that I can't find my all-organic skin care line or the organic deodorant that I like. Those gaps seem reasonable, if not to be expected, even with our lovely health food store.

The thing that really worries me about this is the long-term effects. Not for my eyelashes or my armpits, but for my cultural savvy. For two months, it's okay that I missed some edgy films and haven't eaten Palak Paneer. But what happens over time? Year after year of not knowing what films have come out, of not trying new restaurants, of not having any access to anything NOT designed and marketed for mainstream America. You can order almost anything on the Internet, but what about when you don't even know a product exists? Or you've never seen a style to know to look for it?

Will I eventually become a country mouse Van Winkle, one of those people walking around with a feathered-back hairstyle and heavy-black mascara who has no clue what's happening in the cultural world?