Thank you so much for calling the Skin-Care Hotline! We know that products, tools, and complexion complexities can be confusing, but we’re here to help you face these challenges head on.
If you accidentally spilled a brutally expensive serum on your countertop and are looking for consolation, please press 1.
If your face is on fire because you didn’t read a product’s directions carefully, we’d say press 2, but we know how you are with directions.
If you saw a sponsored ad for a twenty-nine-dollar beauty tool that promises to erase wrinkles and make pores disappear while it gently massages your face and whispers compliments, please press 3 and we’ll transfer you to the Better Business Bureau.
If you bought that tool anyway, despite its magic-based claims, we completely understand.
Press 4 if your five-step skin-care routine is denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance/filters, and you’d like suggestions for something a little more tangible.
If you gave yourself a D.I.Y. kitchen-steam facial (from a pot of boiling pasta water or the end of the dishwasher cycle), you’re clearly just calling to brag because that’s very crafty, and we applaud your ingenuity.
If you don’t want to feel left out when people talk about microdermabrasion, jade rollers, hyaluronic acid, activated charcoal, snail mucin, and other skin-care words that aren’t just “soap,” press 5 and we’ll catch you up.
If you are a man wanting to know if it’s cool to keep using the dog shampoo as face wash, please hang up and continue to live your life with wild abandon.
Press 6 if you no longer have space in your bathroom for another skin-care product, and we’ll teach you how to build a larger, more efficient dream bathroom out of tiny empty bottles and Sephora samples.
If you just saw another article about an insanely rich celebrity who looks amazing “for her age,” and would like to scream into the void, do so now.
If you are dealing with a complicated life challenge, please press a sheet mask onto your face and wait for it to resolve at least seventy per cent of the issue.
Press 7 if today someone at work said, “You look tired!”—even though you executed your skin-care routine flawlessly and slept just fine—and we’ll give you some clever suggestions for future retorts.
If you have ever watched hours of YouTube skin-care tutorials, or even just stared at your face in the mirror long enough to be able to map its surface from memory, maybe it’s time to take a nice walk.
If you are calling to clarify the order in which you should use cleansers, toners, serums, creams, moisturizers, spot treatments, oils, and masks, the answer is, no one knows.
O.K., someone knows. Press 8.
If you naturally have tiny pores and smooth, glowing, healthy, baby-soft skin, please don’t stand too close to us in photos, thank you. (You, too, babies.)
If you would like an entirely new head, please stay on the line.
