During the war, women without nylons drew lines up the backs of

The words of Susanna Reid draw a bridge between two great trials of history: the days of war and the days of pandemic. When she speaks of women in wartime drawing lines up the backs of their legs to mimic scarce silk stockings, and of women in the age of Covid-19 painting over grey hair with shadows and sprays, she is not merely describing vanity. She is unveiling the eternal resilience of the human spirit—the power to preserve dignity and beauty even when the world strips away its comforts.

In the years of the Second World War, luxuries vanished. Silk was claimed for parachutes, food was rationed, and even daily life was bound in austerity. Yet women, facing bombs and loss, still chose to create the illusion of grace. A line of pencil down the leg was not trivial—it was defiance, a declaration that the war could starve their tables but not their spirits. They would walk with heads high, beauty intact, reminding the world that humanity could not be broken by scarcity.

So too in the age of Covid-19, when salons closed, gatherings ceased, and the rhythms of normal life shattered, people reached for small acts of preservation. To touch up grey hair at home, to improvise with dark eyeshadow, was to cling to continuity, to say: Even in crisis, I remain myself. Reid shows us that these gestures are more than appearances—they are symbols of endurance, little victories of order against the chaos pressing in.

The ancients knew this truth as well. In times of siege or famine, they adorned themselves with ritual, painted their bodies, braided their hair, and walked proudly before their enemies. These acts were not foolish; they were weapons of the spirit. To care for appearance when the world collapses is to say: My humanity is mine. You cannot take it from me.

Thus, Reid’s words remind us that survival is not only bread and medicine—it is also dignity, pride, and hope. The stockings of war and the hair dyes of plague are the same: symbols that no matter how great the trial, people will always find ways to affirm their identity. And let this wisdom be passed down: in the smallest gestures, even those that seem vain, lies the deepest heroism—the refusal to let suffering define the soul.