life and minor surgery

... life goes on ... but I definitely feel different. I had minor surgery last week to remove a small lipoma - a benign tumor about the size of a big wad of chewing gum from my right cheek. I had begun to notice it a few years back, but was hoping no one else would. I couldn't imagine paying for plastic surgery so I figured my preoccupations with it were idle concerns. Until the first time a friend asked whether I had the mumps.... Though I knew she was extraordinarily perceptive, I knew it was just a matter of time before others noticed and I would have to claim it.

I have always held a (barely conscious) belief in the importance of "being perfect," in physical form. So much so that when I was in my twenties, and discovered a patch of dryness on my leg that seemed to have no outward cause, I balked at the idea of some part of me not being "perfect." So, with this anomaly, I once again bumped up against my notion of physical perfection and how I had so identified with it early on. Very odd - that little pocket of absolutist thinking that had escaped detection until now.

At first, I tried out different ideas (or even rationalizations) about my face - that I had always had it (the fatty pad), which meant it was a natural part of me that didn't need to be removed, that it was natural because God had made me, etc. And I looked for ways to camoflauge it - with my hair all bushy and combed forward or trying blusher to define a cheekbone that wasn't there. I even considered the value of turning slightly to one side instead of facing someone directly, so it wouldn't be as obvious. But I bristled at that idea because I defined myself as direct in my communication and didn't want to change. (Form follows function. Would function follow form?)

I used to watch the Extreme Makeover shows and muse about what I would have done, if given the chance, and what I would not. It raised my consciousness not only of life's little "imperfections," but also of how we much we as a culture value how we look on the outside, and that beauty is defined as being symmetrical and "perfect" (meaning without flaw).

I ran through the gamut of what it could mean to my life, and tried to find a way to relate to it in the Japanese word Wabi-sabi, the "'Japanese art of appreciating the imperfect, the primitive, the incomplete,' .... Wabi-sabi asks that we 'set aside our judgements and our longing for perfection,' and concentrate instead on 'the beauty of things as they are'" (Publishers Weekly, Amazon.com).

I stole looks at my face in private until I could live with it. Then I began to be more proactive and point it out to people - close friends at first, then family, and then work colleagues, in order to call attention to it before they did, and thus render my embarassment mute. At first it was awkward but it worked. By naming it and owning it, I was no longer trying to live in the shadow of myself. And even though some friends said they couldn't tell if I hadn't had mentioned it, I wasn't so sure. But their kindness and discretion was noted and appreciated.

I finally came to terms with my face, through introducing the subject on my own and after repeated scrutinizations. I measured the width and depth of it, the look and feel of it, and somehow gained some kind of acceptance of it. It became part of my picture of myself, no longer a stranger -- not entirely perfect, but not rancid either. A "human" part of me.

In the "coming out" of it, I grew courageous (and accepting) enough to mention it to my doctor to see what he would say. He referred me to a plastic surgeon; I began to research about it on the internet. The plastic surgeon referred me to an Otolaryngology/Head and Neck Surgeon who successfully and easily removed it. (A bit of a wizard, was he.)

It was funny that after the surgery, upon looking at myself, it was like looking at someone else, like someone I could have been if I hadn't had that fatty pad in my cheek. I hadn't realized it til then, but I had incorporated the look of my face into who I was. I had started expressing the funny, kooky side of myself more. Now however, I was face to face with another, more womanly, more stately self. She was a mystery to me.

But I am glad to see her and I know we will become as close friends as my old pal, the clown was.

Note the "before" picture was at a party (smiling) and the "after" picture was after surgery (the drugged look).