"Mirror mirror on the wall"

My reflection has turned against me. Used to be I would catch a glimpse of my self and this nice person, who looked...ok, glanced back. She wasn't all that thin, but didn't look too bad, and she wasn't shy about revealing a wrinkle or a grey hair. But she always managed to find a flattering way to look back. I carry an image of that woman around in my head. So you can imagine my shock when these days I look in the mirror, and that nice woman is gone. In her place, is an old and somewhat dowdy person that I don't know. That nice woman took off sometime around my last birthday.

Inside nothing's changed. I don't feel any different, every now and then I'm reminded I'm not 18 anymore, but for the most part, you could fool me. I remember when my mom passed away, My dad and her brothers were looking for the perfect photo of her to have up at the memorial, and they choose this picture from when she was 16. I kept thinking, that's not my mother... but to them, that's who she always was. And I'm sure that's who she always thought she was too. She had a warm kind smile and a gleam in her eye, especially when she saw one of her grand children. I remember that gleam peaking out of that 16-year old's eyes. Yup, that was my mom. They were right.

We all have this image of ourselves that's frozen in time. Then comes the day when our self image stops looking forward, while the rest of us keeps going. It's why we do stupid things, like heavy lifting that hurts our back, or try on some old outfit and wonder when it shrunk. It's why woman are slow to update hairstyles and continue to shop in the juniors department, well past thier "juniors expiration date." it's hard to keep up when our mental image of ourselves is lagging way behind.

I think we all live in a parellel world. There's our outside person, the one that is starting to frighteningly resemble our grandmothers, and the inside person. that one that is having a great time, full of life, self confident and as beautiful as ever. I often feel as sassy as a tall blond, you can imagine my dissapointment when I look in the mirror and find a short middle-aged greek. It just doesn't add up.

When I look at other people they've remained the same, their reflections may be betraying them, but their outsides are just like that 16 year old photo of my mom. When I see my sister, she's the same 10 year old who told me she was an alien and made me cry. And when my cousins were all together, they were the same girls as the ones huddled up in one of our bedrooms getting yelled at by the grownups for being too noisy. And my children, neices and nephew, they may be grown, but they still look like kids to me.

This new woman in the mirror, I may not know her, and I may never invite her into my self image. As long as she doesn't hold me back, I'll let her tag along. But she better behave, and she better be able to keep up.

my outside and inside self in Italy.