The Great Skincare Awakening: Beginning a midlife crisis in seven steps

Or, how I learned to stop worrying and love the serum.

Photo by Cristi Ursea on Unsplash

There’s something profoundly absurd about standing in the skincare aisle at the big box store at 7:30 p.m. on a Friday, holding a jar that promises to “reverse time’s cruel march” while “fortifying your skin’s natural barrier.”

I should probably call Matt La Luz for advice—he knows what’s what at the potions and poisons aisle—but instead I’m here alone, squinting at ingredient lists like I’m decoding ancient hieroglyphics.

I’m forty-something, which in Asian mother years translates to “Why do you look so tired? Are you drinking room temperature water? I told you not to drink ice water. Also, here’s L’Oreal sunscreen I bought you in bulk from Costco.”

My mother’s skincare philosophy was forged in the crucible of immigrant pragmatism and an almost mystical fear of UV rays.

“Don’t get too dark,” she’d warn, as if prolonged sun exposure might somehow revoke my citizenship. “You’ll look like leather.”

This wasn’t vanity speaking. This was Imelda Marcos-level Ilocano science, handed down through generations of women who treated SPF 50 like a sacrament and considered a tan the dermatological equivalent of moral failure.

So here I am, the dutiful son, finally heeding decades of maternal wisdom by embarking on what can only be described as a skincare journey.

Except “journey” implies I know where I’m going, and right now I’m more like a confused tourist who accidentally wandered into the luxury district of Seoul, clutching a phrase book written entirely in Tibetan script.

The products have names that sound like they were developed by NASA scientists having a poetry slam.

“Retinol Renewal Complex.”

“Hyaluronic Hydration Booster.”

“Peptide-Infused Age-Defying Miracle Elixir.”

I half expect one of them to come with a warning label: “May cause temporal displacement. Do not operate heavy machinery while existing in multiple timelines.”

My tiny former-hotel-room studio bathroom counter now resembles a chemistry lab designed by someone with severe OCD and an unlimited budget.

There’s the morning serum (“This purges the oils”), the evening toner (“This puckers the pores”), the dermaplaning scalpels (“These blades swipe out the dead skin”), and the nighttime moisturizer (“This moisturizes in the nighttime”).

The instructions read like assembly directions for IKEA furniture written by someone having an existential crisis: “Apply sparingly to clean skin. Allow to absorb. Are your looks worth enhancing? Repeat daily.”

The ritual itself has become oddly meditative.

I smooth on products with the careful attention of a monk arranging prayer beads, each step a small rebellion against the inevitable march of time.

My face now experiences more pampering than my MacBook where this writing magic happens.

The strangest part is how it makes me feel: simultaneously ridiculous and responsible, like I’m finally adulting in the most superficial way possible.

I’ll sit on my sofa afterward, face feeling suspiciously tight and smelling like what I can only describe as “expensive laboratory,” watching my favorite episodes of Air Disasters and Contraband: Seized at the Airport.

Nothing says “sophisticated skincare routine” quite like following it up with 45 minutes of people catastrophically failing at airplane maintenance or trying to smuggle exotic animals in their luggage.

There’s something beautifully absurd about this juxtaposition. Me, face gleaming with anti-aging serums, watching a Airbus plummet into the Atlantic because someone forgot to check the fuel gauge.

It’s like meditation, if meditation involved learning about the seventeen different ways a cargo door can malfunction while your pores allegedly shrink.

But here’s the thing that haunts my 3 a.m. thoughts: my grandparents didn’t have wrinkles. Not the way we think about them now.

They had faces that looked like they’d lived: weathered, wise, earned.

My grandfather’s hands were maps of hard work, and my grandmother’s smile lines were proof of decades of laughter.

They didn’t moisturize and shine; they just existed with the casual confidence of people who had bigger things to worry about than whether their collagen production was optimized.

So maybe this whole skincare expedition is just an elaborate form of procrastination, a way to exert control over something, anything, when the bigger questions of midlife feel too overwhelming to address.

What am I doing with my life?

Am I happy?

Have I made good choices?

Quick, apply the retinol!

At least my skin cells are making progress.

The truth is, I don’t know what’s next in this soon-to-be-midlife adventure.

Maybe I’ll become one of those men who knows the difference between peptides and ceramides.

Maybe I’ll realize it’s all expensive nonsense and go back to washing my face with bars of Irish Spring.

Maybe I’ll achieve the holy grail of Asian skincare goals and remain mysteriously ageless until I’m ninety, at which point people will assume I’ve made some sort of deal with the Annabelle doll.

Or maybe, and this is the most terrifying possibility, maybe this is just what growing up looks like in the 21st century: standing in the bathroom at midnight, applying serums with scientific precision while wondering if our grandparents ever worried about their skin’s “natural barrier” or if they were too busy building actual barriers against actual problems.

Whatever happens, I’m committed to this experiment. If nothing else, it’s given me something to do between episodes of watching planes fall out of the sky and people get arrested for hiding fruit bats in their carry-on luggage.

And really, isn’t that what midlife is all about? Finding weird ways to feel productive while the universe continues its beautiful, chaotic, wrinkle-inducing march toward whatever comes next.

At least my face will be well-moisturized for the journey.

I really need to call Matt.