Makeup is great. It can cover your blemishes. It can accent the structure of your face. It’s also, wait for it, not gendered.

I’ll give you time to clean your glasses and look at that again. Got it? No? Let me see if I can rephrase: makeup is not for girls only.

The doors are wide open and let the boys come!

I was walking with a friend around the casino. I live near Mohegan Sun in Connecticut. In the casino there’s many shops. I don’t go to buy stuff but I go to look and get free samples. This friend happened to be male. I pointed us in the direction of Sephora and held out my hand until he gave me his so I could see the different swatches of color against his skin. I found his skin tone and applied a quick dab of concealer over his red blotches on his cheeks. I then found a little highlighter, and little bronzer, and little blush. Please, I encouraged him to look in the mirror. He was dreading turning around to his reflection behind him, saying how he was expecting to see him looking like a clown. Finally, he looked, and he was stunned. He even made one of those little breathy sounds of awe. His red blemished from old acne was gone. He cheekbones were pronounced and his jaw more square. He looked like he could be in a movie.

Now I went to Sephora again with another male friend. I joked with him that I would give him a little makeover, and before we got into the store, he was bribing me not to put makeup on him. I didn’t take his money and I did respect his wish, but in return I had to ask why? What’s so bad about makeup? He sputtered and came out that it’s a girl thing.

He didn’t want to ruin his masculinity.

Okay. Well here’s the thing. Makeup is a tool to enhance your features to help make yourself the best you can be. It might be surprising to some folks, but boys wearing makeup is becoming more normalized.

It’s never too late to practice your makeup. Go to the big brand stores and ask for samples. Buy some cheap makeup and then move your way on up to more expensive, if that’s what you want. I started with green and blue eyeliner with every color eye shadow and didn’t realize there was anything else to makeup than just doing your eyes. Today, about ten years since I began to practice, my makeup style has evolved. Makeup is art, and if you want to express yourself, I want to encourage you and see where you go.

**For instance, the picture above is me in 2011, not realizing that blue eyeliner did not go with yellow eye shadow. I learned, as you can see in the picture below. It's never too late to try something new.