We Don't Know What We Look Like

Isn’t it weird that we don’t really know what we look like? I mean I know what you look like and you know what I look like but all I can do is look down and see myself from the chest down. I have no idea what I look like to everyone.

What about mirrors?

Mirrors are jacked. I mean, I look at photographs of me and they never look like what I see in the mirror. They might as well all be circus mirrors.

Really, I haven’t found that. What I see in a mirror is pretty much accurate, I think.

Maybe it’s just me.

How could it be? Is your eyesight okay?

It’s not good naturally but I wear contacts.

How long have you been wearing contacts?

I got them just before my 16^th birthday. It was one of the greatest things that ever happened to me.

Why?

Before that I was just a goofy nerd always pushing up my glasses or picking up my glasses after the fell off and stuff. They were always in the way.

How old were you when you got glasses?

Fifth grade, however old that is.

I think it’s around 11.

Then I was around 11. All I know is it sucked. My teacher in school thought I was acting out when I kept saying that I couldn’t see the board. He thought I was joking around like, “Oh, I’m sorry, I can’t answer the math problem because I can’t see the chalk board, ha ha.” So he made me move my desk up against the wall right under the chalk board. It was humiliating. I hate when people are sitting behind me. Like they’re looking into my soul through the back of my neck.

That’s too bad. I’m sorry your teacher was that way.

Well, thanks. It was a long time ago. A lot of things happened in my elementary school that shouldn’t have happened. Things that wouldn’t happen today.

You mean…like…

Nothing really bad as far as sexual abuse; just some old school discipline. My third grade teacher had this thing called “The Mummy.” If you talked too much he taped you to a chair in the corner with masking tape and then he wrapped tape around your head covering your mouth. You just sat there. Silent and still. Most people started crying.

What?

Yeah and that wasn’t the bad part. The worst part was when class was over and he took it off. He just yanked. It pulled your hair and your skin. Everything. That’s when even the boys would start crying.

That is awful!

Yeah.

Did you ever get The Mummy?

Yes. Yes I did.

Did you cry?

Uh, yeah.

(Laughing.)

Hey, stop laughing! Everyone cried! It hurt like hell!

I’m sure they did. I’m sure it did. I’m not laughing at you crying I’m just laughing at how terrible it is. That’s the most awful thing I’ve ever heard!

Yeah. Well, then there was my fourth grade teacher who would throw erasers at you if you didn’t keep you head facing forward.

Really?

Yeah—erasers and pieces of chalk. One day I was sitting by the window—the worst place to sit in a class where you can’t turn your head, right? Anyway, I was sitting there and it was winter so it was snowy and everything outside and I hear this car honking its horn. I turned to see what was up and there were two kids who were crossing the street to come to school and a car couldn’t stop on the icy road and it slammed right into them. One kid went under the car; the other one went over.

(Gasp.)

It was terrible. It was the worst thing I’d ever seen. And I was just shocked and I couldn’t look away, right? And I was just about to raise my hand and tell my teacher when—smack!—an eraser hits me right on the cheek. Everyone started laughing and I turned to look at the teacher but there was just this cloud of chalk dust surrounding my head. I thought I’d lost my sight.

(Laugh.)

Really, I did. I thought it blinded me. So I stood up really quickly. Too quickly, actually, because my chair hit up against the desk behind me and my legs buckled out from under me. I collapsed on the floor in the aisle between the rows of desks.

Oh no.

Stupid bastard teacher. I’ve hated him ever since.

What happened to the kids that got hit by the car?

They were fine. Kids are so durable. Like they've got rubber bones.

Yeah, good thing.

Your school sounds like a nightmare. Where did you grow up?

A little town out west.

Remind me never to raise my children in a little town out west. But you’re right: those are things teachers could never get away with today. They’d be out of a job so fast.

Yeah, good thing.

You must’ve had some choice experiences in your elementary school. Everybody’s got some stories.

Well, I was really, really shy. I mostly hid from everything and everyone until I was in sixth grade. I sat silently in class and didn’t really play with anyone at recess. I didn’t even learn how to do monkey bars until one day when I was, like, 17 and my friends and I were hanging out at a city park. I don’t even really have any memories of elementary school.

What happened in sixth grade to break the shell?

I got invited to my first boy/girl party. I had one real friend and her brother who was a year older than us had a birthday party and she invited me.

Alright!

All the boys wanted to sit by me instead of Jessica Lawson (the “pretty” girl in my homeroom).

Nice!

It was kind of a wake-up call in my young mind that people see me differently than I see myself.

Ha! I told you: mirrors are jacked.

Oh. I guess you’re right. I thought you meant…I don’t know. Yeah, you’re right.

So after that you were the class vixen?

No, no. I mean it helped—it was a huge first step—but I mean it when I say I was really shy. It took awhile for me to really open up. By the time I was in high school life was at least enjoyable.

That’s kind of how I was. Stupid circus mirrors screw everything up.

Yeah.