Pizza Face

My ideal skincare routine would consist of two extremely intensive appointments per year, one in the winter and one in the summer. The general goal would be to fry, peel, exfoliate, or otherwise extinguish the entire outer layer of skin on my face, turning it into a pizza pie without the cheese, and leaning into non-addictive yet intoxicatingly soothing painkillers for two weeks of peaceful, cable television-fueled recovery. The result, in said dream scenario, would be a renewed layer of fresh, dewy skin that required no particular upkeep throughout the year. The benefits of this setup would be twofold. First, I would be free of the daily self-evaluation of the magnitude and composition of my nose pores based upon my current inconsistent skincare regimen and similarly inconsistent diet. Second, my recovery period would provide an extremely convenient excuse for disappearing for two weeks ahead of the year’s biggest events: the summer and winter holidays. I’m thinking May 10 through the 24th and December 1 through the 15th, or so. I could send my regrets to various pre-summer or pre-holiday pseudo-celebration invitations, citing an undisclosed medical concern. This is a surefire way to block further questioning while simultaneously increasing the likelihood of being talked about at said events. “Have you heard about Dan?” All this hullabaloo only for me to reappear on Memorial or Christmas Day proper, skin gleaming, ready to face the world.