THERE IS A LIGHT…

An autistic monologue about inner light and Kylie Minogue.

I’m struggling to write a bit at the moment because my ancient decrepit laptop finally died and I can’t afford to replace it right now, so I’m downstairs on the big computer like I’ve been consigned to the computer room and it’s 2001, which isn’t ideal as I prefer writing in bed, at 2am… usually covered in crumbs.

Do you believe in magical people? I ask not out of some kind of mania but because I just watched the Kylie documentary and I fully believe she is some kind of rare magical person… and I’m trying to think of what I mean by that, but I think Nick Cave explained it best in that some people are just full of light. And whether that light is joy, creativity, confidence, kindness, or some combination of our more positive qualities, it’s something that people are drawn to, like moths. Maybe it’s energy, I don’t know. Everything is energy.

As I write my memoir I have been thinking a lot about the multitude of famous women who have made me who I am, all the Britney’s and J-Lo’s and Pamela Anderson’s who I looked up to and tried to emulate, and there is no bigger influence on me than Kylie. Her pictures have always been central to my mood board, because throughout my life and beyond all the feminist criticism that told me being sexy was wrong, I just love looking at beautiful women and always have done. I feel inspired by it. Especially Kylie. She has been the star of my inner world since I was seven-years-old at my childminders house, watching her get married to Jason Donovan in Neighbours. It’s the only wedding I have ever been remotely interested in - apart from the one in Euphoria. Sorry Posh and Becks.

I think I liked Kylie initially because she was pale and petite. Growing up in the 90s there weren’t a lot of sexy women in the public eye who were pale and small like I was. I remember cutting her pictures out of magazines and sticking them on my walls and text books, especially during her “Deconstruction” era. Kylie has always been so incredibly expressive and photogenic and I think they really captured that in the documentary. What a chameleon she is, how playful and innocent yet sexual she has always been. I find it endlessly fascinating.

I suppose when you grow up insecure it can go one of either two ways. You either hate everyone that is prettier than you and shrivel and dry up like a prune, or you marvel and appreciate and learn how to recreate a little bit of that beauty for yourself. I started young and awkward, but bit-by-bit I studied how to be pretty, which sounds weird, but it is 100% what I did. I wanted to be pretty so much that I think I manifested it. I’m autistic so I learn by copying things, so I would copy the makeup and the hair… and later the outfits, poses and facial expressions of celebrities that I looked up to. Not trying to BE them, but to be my own approximation, my own version. And in a lot of ways that is where I got the confidence to be a model, because that is all that modelling is - makeup and hair… and outfits, poses and facial expressions.

Having modelled in the early 00s, when beauty was strict and regimented, where women were encouraged to be ridiculously thin, big-boobed, perma-tanned, and aesthetically pleasing (i.e., never ever age), I won’t lie and say that it didn’t have an affect on me. I was never that bothered about my weight, but I really didn’t want to get old and I quit modelling when I was thirty because I was scared of looking different and embarrassing myself. I am still very hard on myself as a result of those years, but actually, women like Kylie were an inspiration because she was always older, beautiful and relevant.

Obviously I am aware that there is more to life than just looks, and when I describe people having a light, I’m not actually describing the way that they look. It is something that comes from inside - a “joie de vivre” so to say. It’s tenacity and determination, an ability to overcome struggles and still look to the world with joy, kindness and generosity. I see beauty in all of my close friends, and it’s because their light - something about them that makes them special and unique - makes them more beautiful to me than someone who doesn’t have it.

Over time and after a lot of inner work I realised that I have that same light too. Probably not to the extent of Kylie, but it’s there. People are drawn to me and when I am in a positive space good things happen. It’s sad to think about now, because I feel like my light was dimmed for a really long time, but in these past few months it has started to come back again and things are looking up. I’ve been taken on by my old model agency and have been booked on my first shoot as a professional model (again) at 44-years-old. I also start recording a podcast next month where I interview the glamorous women I worked with in my youth to hear their stories and experiences, so I am excited for what the future holds.

As women we are told so much by the media that we have an expiration date, that our looks will run out, that people won’t want us when we are old. I should be so lucky to live in a time where older women like Kylie, J-Lo, and Pamela Anderson are proving that mindset completely wrong, by showing the world that the power combo of inner light and outer beauty is timeless.

Alex x