Photo by Dipo Ogunrinde/AARP
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E Street
We Have a Winner!
Nancy Perry Graham, July & August 2009
From the editor's desk...
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When we offered readers a shot at a free beauty makeover in our March/April issue, we didn't anticipate the enthusiastic response we'd get. An adventurous 26,304 people—both men and women—entered the contest.
Our lucky winner: Valerie "Connie" Hobbs, a retired Johnson & Johnson quality systems analyst who entered in part because she was sick of bad-hair days. "I get down about the way I look," Connie told us upon learning she'd won. "I want to do something about it."
Three years ago Connie moved from New Jersey to Georgia to help out with her son's children. But now that her youngest granddaughter is busy with school activities, Connie has time on her hands—time she wants to use to travel to Europe, China, and South Africa. Her grander goal is to enter CBS's The Amazing Race. Says Connie: "I'm 65 now, but I don't feel older—I just feel free."
But her bad-hair hangups were holding her back. Enter Christopher Hopkins, a.k.a. The Makeover Guy (stagingyourcomeback.com), and his team, who worked their magic on the men and women you read about in "Midlife Makeovers" in our March/April issue. In early April we flew Connie to Minneapolis for a day of primping and pampering at Christopher's reVamp! salonspa. "I felt like a star, like a diva," says Connie.
"You sit home and you watch movie stars and stylists, and to have professionals do that for you is a dream come true. I felt like it was my entourage all around me. It just made me really feel good."
Now back home in Georgia, Connie is having fun with her new look—and outlook. "Usually I just put my hair in a ponytail and put on my baseball cap, but now, with this cut and style, I just played with it all day yesterday. I'm going to go to the store without my baseball cap on. I truly feel inspired. Thank you, AARP."
Connie, it's our pleasure. And now we're counting on you to win that Amazing Race.
Nancy Perry Graham
Editor, AARP The Magazine
aarpmagazine@aarp.org
601 E Street NW
Washington, DC 20049
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