When I was in high school, I woke up only 30 minutes before I had to leave for school. In that time I would throw on clothes, brush my hair and teeth and complain about how tired I was. The only time you saw me with makeup on was for choir concerts or musicals.

As I grew older and my acne got worse, I was desperate to cover it up. Makeup seemed the perfect option, so I set to work hoarding makeup products and skincare, all while trying to master the art of painting on my eyebrows. My collection and skills grew significantly during my freshman year of college thanks to a lot of trial and error. 

Beauty bloggers and articles from Revelist, a female-centered website, showed me a whole new world. Somewhere along the way, makeup became so much more than covering up my insecurities. 

The possibilities in makeup are endless — there are essentially no rules. If you want green eyebrows, you can have them. As someone who always wanted to be good at art but never was, makeup opened up the gate of creativity in my mind. I’ve had the green eyebrows — and red, pink, blue and purple. Sure, people give weird looks in public, but it’s just too fun to stop.

Compared to some others, my makeup is pretty tame. But I want to try as many styles as I can. The fact that I can wear an all black outfit and fire-red eyeshadow with extremely dramatic winged eyeliner is amazing to me. I can match my makeup to my lime green and hot pink Nike’s just because I want to, and it’s incredibly freeing. 

My makeup is how I express myself. I pick out my clothes in the morning and immediately start brainstorming the color and shape of my eyeshadow, full eyeliner or just a little and whether I should wear fake lashes or not. It’s become so much more than a hobby. Being and looking different is something I’m proud of, and my electric blue eyeshadow really helps me with that.

Sometimes it feels like the world tells us everything we can and can’t do, so when I wear “wild” makeup it feels like I’m going against an unspoken boundary of what’s normal and expected. The feeling of standing out in the crowd is like no other. I hope I always stand apart from the social norm because that’s just not where I belong.

Features reporter Taylor Metcalf can be reached at 270-745-6291 and [email protected].