Aladdin’s Cave of lotions and potions will cause your life to flash before you in a haze of lip gloss.

BY ADRIENNE ACTION

Today I found myself entering a new realm, a new dimension, a place where no young girl has gone before…. upstairs in Boots on Half Moon Street, Cork City.

Now, if you’re not familiar with this particular store let me tell you that it is the Rolls Royce of stores for health and beauty and pharmacy.

It is a vast Aladdin’s cave of creams and lotions and beauty products that caters to all needs and pockets.

But as I walked through the shop, over to the stairs and up to the first floor my life flashed before my eyes in a haze of lip gloss and straighteners.

Walk with me if you will through the stages of life beginning at the front door. The first section is filled with the latest offering from over indulged celebrities, most of them called Kardashian or Jenner.

Kits to help you highlight your cheekbones and contour your face in order to distort your features beyond all recognition.

Young ladies in their late teens and early twenties flock around this section to admire the ‘to die for’ products that no self-respecting socialite would be without.

In the second aisle of this section lies the next stage in life.

The highlighters and contouring brushes are replaced with run of the mill pink blushers, and behind that the pots of rouge for the older lady whose aim is to add colour to the cheek for a health flushed look, as opposed to the starved and gaunt trend of the chiselling brigade.

The three stages of a woman’s life are again laid out in the foundation section.

We begin with Bobbi Brown and Maybelline, we move to my section of Clarins and Rimmel, and finally Estée Lauder and Yardley plaster.

The next section deals with perfumes and scents. Again, taking pride of place and prominence is the celebrity endorsed scents that should make you feel empowered and enchanting, brought to you from artists such as Cardi B and Ariana Grande.

Behind that lies my section, true and time-honoured perfumes created by actual perfume companies such as Mugler and Tiffany and Co., behind that, on a low dusty shelf, the remanence of scents gone by, namely Lily of the Valley, hanging on for dear life.

The shop would probably confine these to the dumpster but with older generation discovering social media there would probably be a riot if ladies of a certain age were unable to purchase 4-7-11 in all three sizes.

Then we move on to the hair section. The first vast row is dedicated to the hip young things that like to have a burgundy barnet or platinum blonde to go with the black eyebrows.

Behind this lies the section for those in their thirties that can’t find the time to get to the very much missed salon what with a job and small children.

Highlighting kits and touch up pens, all the convenient ten-minute solutions to a frazzled young mother. And then my section, the do-it- yourself section for those of us that can’t remember the last time we had three hours spare to be lounging in a salon.

We slap on the mixture with nauseous fumes and carry on with our day with a head full of chemicals in hope of covering the roots that seem to appear every four weeks like clockwork. And finally, the industrial strength grey zapping power powder that could knock a horse, it comes with a gas mask and a list of emergency service numbers in case you fall victim to fainting fits or spontaneous combustion.

Face creams begin with light and airy whipped mousses.

Next, we have high SPF fine line reducing creams at about €50 a pop catering to a terrified generation of women that are watching time marching on across their once radiant faces, and finally a type of plaster that needs to be applied with a trowel that stops chucks of your epidermis from falling off.

On a centre stand we have the three stages of underarm care.

Firstly, lightly scented impulse, then sure 24hr and lastly industrial strength Mitchum. Finally on the ground floor we have the shampoo section. Firstly, the dry shampoo for those on the go, then the lovely scents of lavender and the rain forest, and finally the anti-brittle oil in a last-ditch attempt to stop the crowning glory from disappearing down the drain.

Against the back wall, the three stages set out in dental care. Firstly, Colgate and Oral B, then CB12 mouthwash and finally Fixodent and Gorilla Glue, God help us.

So today I found myself at the bottom of the stairs with the intention of visiting the next floor.

The floor where they keep the vitamins and minerals and supplements to aid creaking bones and stiff muscles.

The floor where they keep menopause solutions, and Anusol cream for piles. The floor where they keep solutions for explosive diarrhoea. The floor where they keep incontinence pads.

So the next time you are shopping in Boots for the essentials look around you at the ladies to your left and right, these are your tribe, get to know them as you will be seeing a lot of one another as you carry on through the aisles of life.