I went to this Mac to see if their concealer was keeping up with the Fentys. It's not the easiest Mac to find, but Macs in malls are always a bit of a quest.
There were two employees working that day, and one was with a customer. I approached the other one, ready to tell her all about Mildred, the lone wrinkle on my forehead. Mildred has been threatening me to invite her sister Mavis to come live with her. My wrinkle also claims she has a pair of twin cousins, who are smile lines known as Maude and Marva. I do not want to meet any of these entities. But when they eventually arrive, I'd like to be a true expert in the art of concealer so that I can mitigate their power in between Botox applications, should that ever be suggested by a dermatologist. For now, it's just Mildred and I. And I have to master the art of concealing her before her relatives inevitably arrive and claim real estate on my face. So I come by my need for concealer honestly and like everyone else born in the early 80s I've been wearing Mac products since the 90s. I was curious...had their concealer stayed in the fight? Were they as overrated as Shape Tape? Or had they been knocked out by modern day legends like Cover FX? I was there to buy, not sample. I needed to do the kind of in-depth research that required purchasing something.
The employee refused to meet my gaze and instead ducked behind the counter, opening drawers and moving around bottles. She'd been wiping down the counter but she was suddenly so busy that she literally made herself smaller than Rihanna's perfect nose. I thought it was strange. The other employee was still upselling Lip Glass to her customer, so I just waited by looking around at the place.
A few minutes went by and I noticed another woman walking towards the Mac counter. The employee who was, I imagine, in a chemistry lab mixing the ingredients of Mac items below the counter, jumped up and said, "How can I help you?"
I walked towards the employee and gave her an exasperated facial expression, and said "Wait...?" To which she responded with a "Gee, sorry" shrug, simultaneously acknowledging what she'd done and confirming for me that she was racist. Every single person in this story is white except me. I am black and beautiful. I left the mall immediately. I might have purchased something from the food court under normal circumstances, but I was so annoyed I just left.
When I told everyone I know about this situation, they all shook their heads and tsk-tsk'ed me. Didn't I know this Mac location is patently racist? How could I have missed that tea? Did I enjoy my life on Mars? Because surely only Martians hadn't heard that this Mac is staffed with people who are disrespectful to African-American shoppers? What was wrong with me?
Indeed...what was wrong with me? read more